BT cancellation fee for moving house, keeping same tariff

Mr_Gordon_2

My 89yr old Grandfather has just moved house to the same street as us so he's closer but can remain independant. He's been with BT for as long as he's had a phoneline. My Mum called up BT last week to inform them he was moving and was told the account would be closed and a final bill would come through.

At the new house the new phoneline had been ordered at a cost of £122.50 as the line from the pole had been blown down in the wind before he moved in.

His final bill from his old house came in yesterday with a cancellation fee of (roughly) £70 as he was in a 12 month rolling contract of which none of us were aware. My Mum wasn't told this when she called up to say he was moving. I can't imagine him having signed up to this himself in the first place as he doesn't usually do that sort of thing without discussing it first, but it seems he was. He also pays bills as soon as them come in so he's already posted off his cheque for almost £100 (including this last quarter line rental).

Surely he shouldn't have been charged this fee if he's staying as a BT customer at his new house, taking out a new 12 month contract and staying on the same tariff, and should we not have been told there was a penalty when it was cancelled?

I found an old post on here which says people who move house are exempt from the cancellation fees, is this still the case and do you think we have a hope of getting this back for him.

Thanks in advance for any help.

macman

The rollng contract was introduced by default last April-you are on it unless you opted out.
And you'll not be happy to hear that BT are currently offering free connection if you take an 18m contract and make the necessary qualifying calls...

BT_company_representative

Hi Mr_Gordon

Reply to my PM and I will check the charges raised on your Grandfather's bill.

Cheers
Linda
BT Support

Mr_Gordon_2

Two months later....

BT company representative did indeed look into it for me, they agreed he shouldn't have been charged the fee and agreed to refund it. We were told a cheque would be sent, it didn't arrive. We were told his account would be credited, it wasn't. We called again to check his account and it showed he had never paid the cancellation fee in the first place, only the outstanding line rental so £74 had gone missing. I saw the cheque before it was posted and it was definately for the full amount. The person at BT said it could be an error and it was up to us to provide a bank statement showing the cheque had been cashed. This was done and we've heard nothing since.

I emailed BT Company Rep again two days ago and received no response.

I think a company taking notice of what people talk about on message boards is a great thing, but surely if they then loose interest in resolving it for you it has even more of a negative effect than if they did nothing at all.

I've now contacted Trading Standards to see what they say.

BT_company_representative

Hi Mr_Gordon

I'm sorry to see this, I have sent you a PM and am keen to find out whats happened with the promised refund, agree its not good enough that this is still outstanding two months later.

Regards

Nigel
BT Support