Carphone Warehouse's sneaky tactics?

rocketgrrl · 30 July 2010 at 4:15PM

I have just got off the phone to the Carphone Warehouse after complaining about my phone bill for what must be about the 7th time and I just wanted to know if anyone else has similar problems with them?
To summarise:
I took out a 24 month contract with O2 through the Carphone Warehouse some months ago. In the 'verbal contract' that I agreed to when I took on the phone, the sales rep said I would pay £25, later going down to £20 a month, which would include free web browsing, a bundle of texts and a bundle of calls all in.

I got my first phone bill - they had charged me for all the web browsing, so I called them up, they had to listen to the original sales rep phone call, and then agreed that, yes, the web browsing should be free, so they amended my account.

Next bill: They were not charging for web browsing but they were charging for text messages. Called them again and yes, this was a mistake and my bill would be amended.

Couple of bills later - I am paying less line rental than I was told I would be, but I am also being charged for a web bolt on which, coupled with the line rental means I am paying over £25. I call them again - it transpires that they were always aware of this 'and had been planning' to send a cheque to cover the extra charges because they system can no longer be changed to charge me the correct amount of money.

It seems to me that either they are unspeakably inept, or that it is somewhat a convenience to them to keep making mistakes on people's bills like this - I would not be surprised if less scrupulous people than myself don't actually check their bills, so people like the Carphone Warehouse are getting away with what is effectively theft on a regular basis.

Also, do all mobile phone vendors do the 'verbal contract' thing when you take a contract out? And is this 100% legal?