BT have lost our payment!!!

Jandy100

We paid our bill (£39 line rental) back in February, but received a letter a month ago to say that payment hadn't been received.

After a long phone call they said they'd investigate & we emailed them a copy of our bank statement showing that the payment had been made to the correct account.

I also told them that they still had my maiden name on the account & that please can it be changed, as I had informed them of this on more than one occasion.

A week went by & I received a letter telling me that they had accepted my offer to defer payment. Straight back on the phone again to tell them that I wasn't deferring the payment, as it had already been paid & I had sent them proof of this. I was then asked to send the proof again, so forwarded the email that I sent the previous week.

Another week went by & I got exactly the same letter accepting payment deferral, still addressed to my maiden name.

Repeat the same conversation on the phone again... and my name got changed on the account.

Then I called to find out what was happening, as I still hadn't heard anything & was told the case was closed. By this time I was absolutely mad, so my husband got on the phone to them & was told they were still investigating.

Today I got a letter saying that they can't find the payment & to call within 7 days or the case will be closed.

The Durham number on the letter is closed today, so I have to wait until Monday, but in the meantime I really don't know what I can do.

I've called my bank & they confirmed that the payment had gone out to BT & hadn't bounced back for any reason.

BT ave had proof that the payment has been sent to them, yet because they can't find it I'll get a black mark on my credit score as I don't see why I should pay them again.

The first thing I'm doing when all this is sorted out (eventually!) is cancel my line rental with them & go with someone that can offer a decent standard of customer service & who'll believe you when you put in front of them in black & white that the bill has been paid. Why is it my problem if they can't organise their accounts properly?!!

Apologies for the long post but hopefully someone on here will be able to offer some advice on the next thing to do

They are driving me insane!!! :mad:

bill888

How did you pay the bill last February?

If it was by one-off bank transfer, can I suggest you speak to your own bank, who can approach the receiving bank to find out where the money was deposited.

Unrelated to BT, I have come across a situation in the past where the receiving bank put the money into a temporary holding account if they can't determine who the recipient is due to incorrectly supplied details.

Heinz

Or you could PM BT company representative and ask one of them to investigate.

Jemma-T

Don't give the person you're speaking to too much info. Name changes etc will complicate things for many an idiot on the end of a phone.

Keep it simple and to the point.

Buzby

Don't panic. This happened to my last two payments (quarterly) and there's a special department within BT that can track these payments down. You'll ALSO find they've hit you with a late payment charge, so whilst you are speaking with their funds tracing service, remember to ask them to credit any late payment charge.


They've changed they're bankers recently, and as I usually pay via PC Banking when the revised bank details were input (by my bank) the made a keying error on my account number, giving it an extra digit. The payment was received by BT but placed in a suspense account until it was claimed. They then found it, credited the late fee - and I shouted at my bank for putting in the incorrect A/c number.

All was well again!

Le73Uq86Uv

Deleted post

BT_company_representative

Hi Jandy100

It sounds like we have received your payment without a reference number which means we didn't know which account to add it to - as Le73Uq86Uv quotes when you use bank transfer to pay us we need the account number as a reference so the payment shows on your account.

I'll track down your payment - i've sent you a PM to get some more details.

Cheers
Anne
BT Support

Jandy100

Thank you for all your advice.

I have contacted my bank & they are going to trace the payment for me.

As far as I'm aware the money has gone to the correct account (BT confirmed this when I called them).

I have also contacted the BT rep, who is looking into this for me.

Thank you!

Jandy100

Thank you very much for all your replies, and to the BT rep.

The payment has now been traced - so all is good now!!