CPW! small claims

vjw1986

can anyone help im new to mse and having a few problems with the carphone warehouse.
I took out an upgrade in september 2006 and was offered a contract free for 12months as orange had offered me a fantastic deal.
The young lady at carphone warehouse told me i would need to pay £8.50 for 4 months and then in feb2007 i could claim my £150 chequeback deal.
I called and was told this offer doesnt exist and to basically get lost but they would look into it / listen to the call and call me back (this never happened and has continued to march of this year where iv paid a total of £286.61 for a contract that should have been free of charge.
I would like to take them to the small claims court as they have agreed that because it is over 12 months they cannot listen to the original sales call (prove what they sold)
Can anyone offer me advice on this as it is something i have never done before and dont have much spare cash to pursue it.
Thanks

mobilejunkie

You should never act on anything this company tells you over the phone without getting it clearly in writing first. They tell a great many lies and cannot be trusted at all nowadays. Once they were a great company, but seem determined now to join the long list of fallen corporate angels. You have no proof of anything so I don't see you'd have much of a case unfortunately.

Hopefully your new thread will warn the many others who are tempted by what cpw and their subsidiaries promise over the phone but won't confirm in writing.

Leopard

Your problem is that you cannot (unless it be by something you didn't mention in your posting) prove that they did offer it to you. Nor, indeed, that they offered you anything at all.

I don't doubt you personally (knowing how CPW behaves) but how could you convince a court that they did?

Unless you can, you'll simply be wasting money on the court fees.

vjw1986

thanks i thought that would be the case thats why i didnt jump in head first and do it!
on second thoughts i do have the invoice that came with the handset and im positive it has the details of the chequeback on it. jut gonna have to have a really good look for it! (do you think that would be any help??)
Iv learnt my mistake and wont be tempted by any mobile phone deals again the saying "it sounds too good to be true" is definately right in my case.
CPW have advised they will call me back by tuesday but im not holding my breath.
thanks guys again

mobilejunkie

Not entirely true - I'm definite proof that (in fact) sometimes it's even better than "too good" - BUT you have to know what you're doing and cover yourself at every stage. If the invoice backs up what you were told on the phone I'd have thought it might be worth threatening to sue with a LBA. You'd almost certainly end up having to sue, but then the risk is the court costs vs what you stand to gain - and it might be a 50:50 or slightly better if the invoice is clear enough.