AOL taking £14.99 since 2008 HELP!

SOOBEE

Hi

I joined talktalk in 2008 in order to accept a competition win, and called aol as I wanted to keep my old email. I was told it would cost me £14.99 to do so. This was purely to access my email. Last sunday, I called aol to see if I could get a reduction and was told email had been free since march 2008. I spoke to a supervisor who said it was only free from december 2008 and would give me a 13 month refund. I said I would still be looking in this as I was told march. Today 12 months was deposited so I called again. This time I was told the free email was from July 2008. The new supervisor stated she would not be giving me the remaining refund as it was on the website so I should of seen it! I am absolutely fuming not only with their response but the discrepancies with the dates seems very fishy. Any advice would be welcomed including an exact date of when free email became available.

Thank you

penrhyn

Sorry, but you were paying £15/month to retrieve old emails from a defunct account?
So you were effectively paying twice for your broadband service.
Talk Talk and AOL are the same company there is no way you should have had to pay anything for this ever.
It would have been a better bet to get a Google mail (or similar) account and advise all your contacts of the change.

Infidel

And this ladies and gentlemen is why I choose never to use ISP email addresses (or other such establishments).

SOOBEE

Infidel wrote: »

And this ladies and gentlemen is why I choose never to use ISP email addresses (or other such establishments).

Thanks mate really helpful.

kwikbreaks

SOOBEE wrote: »

Thanks mate really helpful.

It's certainly useful for others and for your own future reference.

You agreed to pay AOL £14.99 to access an old email account. That was a verbal contract. You are lucky that they are agreeing to pay you anything back as they are under no legal obligation to do so regardless of what policy changes have taken place in the meantime.

Infidel

SOOBEE wrote: »

Thanks mate really helpful.

No probs.

Wishing you the best of luck for the future.

SOOBEE

kwikbreaks wrote: »

It's certainly useful for others and for your own future reference.

You agreed to pay AOL £14.99 to access an old email account. That was a verbal contract. You are lucky that they are agreeing to pay you anything back as they are under no legal obligation to do so regardless of what policy changes have taken place in the meantime.

Actually the contract never ended, it was a continuation of an account that I had held for over 15 years furthermore I have taken advice and have been told the fact they agreed to pay anything means they have admitted wrongdoing and that as an account holder I must be informed of any changes to my account. Also, the bit that says help in the title means one is looking for helpful advice for their current situation. Making someone feel like a !!!! whilst not knowing how their internet packages are set up is very annoying.

kwikbreaks

Your account never changed - they continued to take the £14.99 you agreed to pay them in return for access. The fact new customers were offered different terms is irrelevant - VM for instance do this all the time and the only way existing customers can get similar discounts is to ask when their existing minimum term is completed.

If you pushed on with a claim for a bigger refund I doubt that they would admit wrongdoing they would claim that their refund offer was an ex-gracia payment.

If you want legal advice though I'd suggest you ask on a different board as this one is aimed at internet access.