TalkTalk not collecting Direct Debit Payments

dansdan

Hi,

I'm at a bit of a loss here. Basically, TalkTalk are not taking payments by Direct Debit and charging me a fee for a rejected Direct Debit request.

I've been with TalkTalk since August this year. They have yet to collect a Direct Debit payment from my healthy bank account (ie, not overdrawn or likely to be very easily). The Direct Debit was set up fine, and I got a letter stating this. I checked my bank account before the first payment (in September) and it appeared that the money had been put aside, so to speak, following the request for it from TalkTalk. That'll do for me, I thought, as I had more than enough funds in the bank to pay for the demand - all was well. I received October's bill and it was for twice the monthly line rental/broadband charges, plus a bit extra. I looked further into the bill and they had charged me for September's and October's usage plus a Direct Debit rejection fee of £7.50. I immediately called TalkTalk, who (eventually) said the payment was rejected by my bank because there was not enough money in the account. I knew this was not true, but TalkTalk insisted I did not have enough money to pay the bill. I checked my bank account and sure enough, no payment had been taken - but there was certainly plenty in my account to cover it, plus overdrat facility. So I went to my bank to enquire. They couldn't understand it, but noticed the Direct Debit frequency was marked with N/A instead of monthly - it was a fault with setting up the direct debit at TalkTalk's end, they said. I was recommended to cancel the direct debit, leave it a few working days and set up a new one. Which I did, and received a confirmation of Direct Debit setup at the beginning of November. I ended up paying for both September's and October's usage by debit card (coming from the same account which, according to TalkTalk, had no money in it...).

So, for November I received my monthly TalkTalk bill: Rejected Direct Debit fee of now £10 (was £7.50 last month) and a debit card fee (or it's equivalent) of £3.50. The new direct debit was set up in good time and appeared in my bank account's Direct Debit list, and payment was due to be retrieved from my bank account (still nice and healthy). Guess what? No payment request from TalkTalk. I know they are going to charge me again for a Rejected Direct Debit Fee and for the debit card handling fee, which I will have to pay them to keep me connected. Who knows what it's doing to my credit report in the meantime...

I have tried talking to TalkTalk but I was going round in circles. After being asked for the third time what my date of birth was, and half way through the second round of answering the first line of my address and my postcode, before being cut off half way through my postcode to ask what my date of birth was, I thought I was getting nowhere.

I have sent them an email using their online form but not sure if this will have any affect, if it gets there.

What should I do now? Any advice would be greatly received!!