NTL Non Direct Debit Payment Charges

madmax69

I am glad I found this thread - I was thinking it was just me being utterly undreasonable! I've been with "NTL"/Virgin since the days of Diamond Cable in 1988 or so so I've seen a catalogue of billing horrors and have had several formal complaints over the years over billing issues. I really just do not know what's wrong with this company and why they have such problems sorting things out.

I am utterly incensed at the non-direct debit fee and am busy looking around for an alternative ISP but they all seem as crooked and onto the same fiddle.

They're offsetting fixed operating costs to consumers. Effectively they're making geninue cost-savings in paper bill generation and office space+staff then making a net cash gain by keeping the customer fees the same (i.e. not passing the very real cash savings on overheads onto "customers") and finally having the cheek to offset a levy onto anyone who stymies their plan to become "paperless" by charging a disproportionately and unreasonably high fee!. I am baffled at why the regulators have not cottoned on to this. I know they're struggling to recoup the investment fees in the cable network but treating customers like crooks is NOT the way to do it. I just hope some senior Virgin (or ex-NTL) managers read this thread and pull their finger out at the next management meeting.

A fee of maybe £1 might be reasonable but I see it's not gone up to £5 +VAT since Virgin took over so the fees or "fines" are getting close to the actual cost of the product. What is wrong with this picture??. I used to have phone+TV and broadband but I simply became sick of constant errors and NTL slipping the odd £1 or £2 on my phone bill here and there for services I never ordered and decided to keep only the basic 2MB broadband.

I did ring to cancel my broadband last year but managed to negotiate a few months at £9.99 pcm - but another catalogue of horrors followed. I then started to get ONE bill for THREE separate broadband connections at £9.99 each. I spent hours on the phone queueing to NTL customer support and received several assurances that the error was corrected but 6 months later the bills were getting bigger and bigger. The only way I got it sorted was threaten in writing to take them to the telecomms regulator. I do NOT want to have to spend my life doing this stuff just to purchase a service from some poxy company. There has to be a point where people simply have enough and decide to make do without the service altogether. Something such companies appear to have forgotten?.

My friends thought I was nuts complaining about NTL all the time until one of them had a similar experience. At Christmas whilst everyone was out of the house and away for the hols they were billed for two films they could not possibly have watched. A row with NTL billing saw the bill refunded but then on the next bill several pornographic films were itemised. No, this is NOT urban legend!. Although someone probably thought this was humourous revenge, my mate's missus has a serious problem with porno and she was extremely upset (to say the least) and a divorce or separation was getting very likely. Not made any better by difficulty in clearing up the problem with NTL. Eventually the billed items were cancelled and it was suspected (although not proven and I can't claim here) that a disgruntled member of staff had added the items on after the previous row over billing. This sort of stuff is absolutely NOT FUNNY!.

Subsequently he asked (no, in fact he demanded) NTL to remove all PIN type access from the service which they did. However, on testing it to make sure they had done so he found he had full access to all billable material with no PIN at all!. Yet another call needed. Tsk.

I'm now at the point where, although I'm a "net head" I may have to decide enough is enough and say goodbye to NTL permanently and perhaps go back to bad old dialup and retrieve my email from a friend or relative's house!. I've looked at Talk Talk who do a good deal which I helped set up for a neighbour but unfortunately they demand direct debit and won't do normal bills. Although I can see there are cost-savings to be made, surely there ought to be some sort of law against this?. It is very close to extortion and is creating a society where if you don't have a bank account you will be shut out of it.

One very very very unhappy NTL customer

(Per pro. another unhappy NTL customer also!)

fuzzball27

I can totally agree with you regarding the charges set up with direct debit and NTL. I had it set up that the direct debit would come out of our account on the 28th of every month. I was always paid on the 27th of the month. A few christmasses ago they decided to take the money early. So I also incurred charges to my account as it went into an unauthorised overdraft. I phoned NTL but there was no way they were going to put the money into my account and definately not pay my charges. :mad:

I also took great exception to phoning them....kept on hold the longest was 1hour 17 mins....:mad: and also getting through only to have them hang up.

My frustration just grew and grew.......so I took action and had Sky installed and I can honestly say in nearly 2 years of being with them it has been problem free...and my calls are answered albeit in India but at least they dont hang up. :j

kittykat08

Hi,

Just read your moan about excess charges. I've just had the same problem (but with Virgin Media who have taken over ntl) for not paying by direct debit - they have slapped on 2 months with absolutely no notification whatsoever.. Is there any official body whatsoever that we can complain to or do they have us by the short and curlies??? I'm absolutely fuming and am seriously considering changing but is it worth all the hassle?