STUDIO CARDS - Late Payment charge ?

caz1965

I bought a fibre optic christmas tree, from Studio cards.
£39.99
Payed the first month (£10.00 by cheque)
Sent a cheque for the second payment, the week before christmas, with a week to spare, as I know they charge you if you are late.
I got a new monthly statement, telling me they have added an administration charge (£20), as I had missed a payment!
No "please where is your payment?"
I want to write a letter complaing about it. If I had know it hadn't arrived, i could have payed over the phone.
Can I refuse to pay, as now, instead of owing £30.00, they say I owe £55.00!
Thanks for any help, wish I had gone to Wilkinsons for one now.

ella26uk

Hi

I had the same problem. Just phone them up and refuse to pay the admin charge(they had to go and talk to a manager, but i kept saying I 'm not paying the charge, it was not my fault as I had sent a cheque!). that's what I did, and then I gave them my payment over the phone!

samtman

I used to be a team manager at this company and left due to disgraceful treatment of customers like this. I would always remove the admin charge which I used to go up before the area manager for. When I started the admin charge was £2 for 1 month late, £3 for 2 month etc. Within a year this increased to £20 every month not even a warning to the customer. If you ever shop with this company I would advise you pay full payment as soon as recieved. This company are also ACE Cards. The company comes under Express Gifts Ltd

doogle_chick

This is weird as I had exactly the same thing - sent payment by cheque and then the next invoice showed no payment received and an admin charge.

I cancelled the cheque and then sent another cheque for the original amount with a letter saying I refused to pay the extra charge as I had sent payment on time.

I stopped using this company before because of their ridiculous charges but thought I'd try this year as spotted some bargains.

Will not be touching them with a bargepole after this though. Clearly they make all their money from the late payment fees. Why can't they offer a pay at time of ordering option as well?

dbonbon

I'm just interested to know, and excuse my ignorance, but why would anyone pay for a £40 christmas tree in installments?

I do think that to add a £20 late payment fee onto this sort of amount is absolutely outrageous - has the cheque you sent been cashed? This sounds like a nice little earner for the company - bin a cheque when it arrives and blame the customer while charging an extra £20. Absolute cowboys! I can only advise, unfortunately with the benefit of hindsight, that if you want to do these sort of transactions in future then you will have to post by recorded delivery.

appleblossom

dbonbon wrote:

I'm just interested to know, and excuse my ignorance, but why would anyone pay for a £40 christmas tree in installments?

I do think that to add a £20 late payment fee onto this sort of amount is absolutely outrageous - has the cheque you sent been cashed? This sounds like a nice little earner for the company - bin a cheque when it arrives and blame the customer while charging an extra £20. Absolute cowboys! I can only advise, unfortunately with the benefit of hindsight, that if you want to do these sort of transactions in future then you will have to post by recorded delivery.

Because, not everyone has £40 cash in their pocket to go and and buy one from the shops - thats why!!!

sapphire_uk

This happened to me a while ago. I phoned them and what they agreed was to send me a £25 voucher to use. So i ended up having to pay the £20 fee. but i did also get the £25 voucher. I do like the items they sell, but now i pay straight away for anything i have from them.

Chocmonster7

julieblake wrote:

Because, not everyone has £40 cash in their pocket to go and and buy one from the shops - thats why!!!

If that was the case then live without it! Getting into debt for the sake of a flashy Christmas tree is a very slippery slope to get onto.

As to the original question, find out if they have cashed the cheque then challenge them. It's the same kind of thing as the banks as doing, they have to justify why it costs them £20.

keatergreyhound

Write them a letter addressing it to Mr Bannister data controller.
Youll get a nice letter back with the charges removed. Been there done it and got almost £250 back from a parcel I had go missing that I wouldnt pay for!

denton6

caz1965 wrote:

I bought a fibre optic christmas tree, from Studio cards.
£39.99
Payed the first month (£10.00 by cheque)
Sent a cheque for the second payment, the week before christmas, with a week to spare, as I know they charge you if you are late.
I got a new monthly statement, telling me they have added an administration charge (£20), as I had missed a payment!
No "please where is your payment?"
I want to write a letter complaing about it. If I had know it hadn't arrived, i could have payed over the phone.
Can I refuse to pay, as now, instead of owing £30.00, they say I owe £55.00!
Thanks for any help, wish I had gone to Wilkinsons for one now.

Ring them up and ask if they will drop the payment,i had something similar happen to me with ace cards and they said they would take the charge off this once.Worth a try anyway.

dbonbon

julieblake wrote:

Because, not everyone has £40 cash in their pocket to go and and buy one from the shops - thats why!!!

I guess i've touched a nerve there?

Getting into debt for the sake of having a £40 xmas tree seams ludicrous. If the person is that hard up then not buying the tree in the first place would surely have been the more prudent approach. Don't spend above your means. It's the start of the slippery slope.