"Orange" offers

nej

Hi all,

A couple of months ago my wife received a call from Orange, saying that as she was a loyal customer they would give her 10% off if she took out another years contract. We're quite happy with Orange so she accepted the deal.

This month we get the bill in and it's £30 higher than normal (£90 not £60 for both phones). We pored over the bill and found that her calls had incurred many more costs. Eventually we realised that whilst she had got the 10% discount, they had removed the "Free Time 200", so she was getting 200 minutes less per month! We tend to use the mobile much more than the house phone because of the free minutes, so it added up to quite a lot.

Obviously we got straight on the phone to Orange. I explained we hadn't authorised the removal of that, but they said that was a deal when we signed up and any other deal (i.e. 10% off) would remove it. They then told us that it was a dealer that had called us, not Orange themselves. The dealer plainly introdcued themselves as "from Orange". Naturally we told them to put the old talk-plan back and to refund the extra from this bill. The guy said he couldn't do that as we had authorised it. I asked to be put through to a supervisor who was very helpful, and put back the old talk-plan, left the 10% discount on for good measure and has arranged a £30 credit for the next bill! So much for couldn't do it! I was very impressed with her attitude and it certainly stopped me cancelling which I was about to do.

She said that Orange do not call up like that, and asked that if we receive any other calls then to ignore them, or complain to the dealer making them.

Ok, rant over!

JasonLVC

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=167052

This has been discussed quite recently (see link) and I too have had the 'we're calling from 3 do you want to upgrade' call, even though I'd cancelled with 3, months before - so at least due to timing I could tell it was not 3 calling.

Perhaps we all need to be mindful that we should never accept a deal over the phone, even if it is from a reputable company. If it's a good deal, it will be there tomorrow and they can write to confirm details, etc.

Human nature is strange in that we'd tell a door salesman to ...off, but accept a call from our 'own telephone provider' and buy from them. Same with utility firms. My electric provider called me to tell me to go dual fuel with them and save pounds, as a regular MSE'r I knew I already had the best rate going at the time and when I asked him to work it all out for me, his 'cheapest' deal was £40 per annum dearer than my own deal. He ended the call after that and didn;t bother writing to me with his 'deal'!.

snaffler

As an Orange PAYG customer I have had far superior deals to many of my friends tied into a contract.

4 Months ago me and my g/friend were viewing the Orange Web Site OFFERS FOR PAYG customers, we signed up to all of them and they are all working brilliant.

All we have to do it put on £10 per month before the expiry date, which can easily be found out when checking current balance and for that we now get the following.

£10.00 of calls for the £10 we put on of course.
300 FREE TXTs
600 FREE minutes evening on network calls (it just so happens all friends except 1 is on the Orange)
£3 worth of Free Orange World
+ 10% of money free in call time so I put on £10 they give me 10% = £1.

PAYG with orange has never been so good :j