How long do I give Orange to reply?

January20

I have a contract with Orange which expires at the end of September.

I sent them a letter on 8th of August (recorded) which was received on 9th August giving them my notice to cancel the account. As yet, I haven't received any correspondence from them. I specified in my letter that I wanted written confirmation, as I'm never happy unless I have a piece of paper saying an account is closed. I also wanted to know the exact date of my last payment. Anyway, to my question: How long should I give them to reply to this letter? When can I start hassling them for an answer?

Techhead_2

If it was me I would expect an acknowledgement within two weeks (at most) and this to contain an indication of when a full answer would be received.

Personally, I would have called asking for written acknowledgement and if this didn't arrive then chase in writing through the formal complaints procedure.

Jon_01

The signature of receipt will be from the guy in the post room that signs for all the post that arrives that day.
It'll have have been sorted and pasted to the dept that day and will be in their inbox. Bare in mind that some depts get thousands of items of post a day and are always working well behind.
As its only been 11 day (and 4 for those have been weekend days), I wouldn't expect anything for a week of more yet at the soonest. . .

January20

Techhead wrote: »

If it was me I would expect an acknowledgement within two weeks (at most) and this to contain an indication of when a full answer would be received.

Personally, I would have called asking for written acknowledgement and if this didn't arrive then chase in writing through the formal complaints procedure.

I initially emailed them in July to find out the best way to cancel, and was called back pretty quickly to be told it had to be in writing, in letter form, and was given an address to which to send the letter. I thought 2 weeks too so thank you, this is helpful.

Jon_01 wrote: »

The signature of receipt will be from the guy in the post room that signs for all the post that arrives that day.
It'll have have been sorted and pasted to the dept that day and will be in their inbox. Bare in mind that some depts get thousands of items of post a day and are always working well behind.
As its only been 11 day (and 4 for those have been weekend days), I wouldn't expect anything for a week of more yet at the soonest. . .

Yes, Jon I agree with you that they must receive thousands of letter. I'm just worried in case they "lose" the letter and then I can't cancel the contract as soon as I wish and end up paying more than I wish. I have trust issues with these companies!

Thank you both. Your replies have been helpful.

Guys_Dad

Do you intend to take on another mobile service? If so, then the best way to ensure that you are finished with Orange is to ask for a PAC code, which they will give you either on the phone or pdq as they have to by law, AND THEN USE THE PAC CODE WITHIN 30 DAYS to move your number to another network.

That should be done within your last month and is the easiest way to ensure you have terminated.

As to when they will take the last DD, it will be AFTER the contract ends as there can be calls up to the last day that will be charged in the next month - may be later if any overseas calls. It is easier and safer to keep your DD open for a couple of months to ensure any stragglers are collected than to face, in 2 years' time, letters from debt collectors chasing pennies and having your credit record trashed.

January20

Guys_Dad wrote: »

Do you intend to take on another mobile service? If so, then the best way to ensure that you are finished with Orange is to ask for a PAC code, which they will give you either on the phone or pdq as they have to by law, AND THEN USE THE PAC CODE WITHIN 30 DAYS to move your number to another network.

That should be done within your last month and is the easiest way to ensure you have terminated.

As to when they will take the last DD, it will be AFTER the contract ends as there can be calls up to the last day that will be charged in the next month - may be later if any overseas calls. It is easier and safer to keep your DD open for a couple of months to ensure any stragglers are collected than to face, in 2 years' time, letters from debt collectors chasing pennies and having your credit record trashed.

That would have been useful but I don't intend to take on another contract phone. I am contract phone phobic and I am finishing off my dd's contract (it's a long story!). I am more suited to a pay as you go phone!

Thanks for the advice about the DD. It's very sensible.

simax

You could always ring them and ask to convert the contract phone to PAYG. You'll get a new sim in the post a few days before the 30 days notice is up and then you can ring to register it with your existing number. Job done.

Guys_Dad

January20 wrote: »

That would have been useful but I don't intend to take on another contract phone. I am contract phone phobic and I am finishing off my dd's contract (it's a long story!). I am more suited to a pay as you go phone!

Thanks for the advice about the DD. It's very sensible.

You can transfer your number to a PAYG as well, if you wanted to.

January20

I have another pay as you go number that I would prefer to use, but this is food for thought and not a bad idea at all.
(I'm not being difficult at all, it's just I find the number I have now difficult to memorise and the old one I had easy)
Thank you so much!

January20

I just wanted to update this thread just it case it might help someone in the future

I received a letter from Orange on Friday 26th August - letter dated 22nd August. It's the usual "sorry to hear you are thinking of leaving us" and trying to get me to stay blah blah blah.

They gave me a disconnection date "if I decide to leave" and because I'm a little unhappy with the wording of the letter ie it mentions a phone call and not my letter, and the "if you still want to leave us, we will disconnect your service on..." I've decided to send them another letter to make sure. I don't want them to turn round and say that I didn't give them enough notice.

All in all a very ambiguous letter (but I like things clear and straight to the point) and I'm left with an overall feeling of "why do they make it so difficult to leave", so won't be taking a contract out with any one soon! No that is was my plan in the first place lol!

Thanks again to all of you who replied to me

mfranklin

Thanks for this one.