Adept cancellation fees

Baz_500

My mother in law (88yrs), has updated an internet package with Orange. This includes free anytime landline phonecalls.

Two days ago she had 2 letters from Adept, who are her current telecom providers.
The letters stae that she must pay a £30 cancellation fee (plus £6 VAT) within 7 days of her invoice date (22nd Feb), or she will face a county court judgement action.
All of her bills for these suppliers have been paid by direct debit on time. She and her late husband had an original account with Virgin, but they were taken over by Adept a number of years ago. So she never actually 'chose' to be with this company.

She can find no information about cancellation fees in the literature she has and I've just been on their website where it clearly states in FAQ:
18. Isn’t there a catch?

Absolutely not. You simply pay for the calls you make,it’s as simple as that. What’s more you can cancel the service whenever you wish,although you will then lose out on your low cost calls!

How can they charge a 88 year old pensioner £30 and then threaten county court action. We only tried to update her Orange package on 20th Feb

Can they do this??

OldGreyFox

Possibly because she was on a renewable contract with 6 months left to run 6x £5 =£30.

http://www.adept-telecom.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/AdEPT-Residential-Ts-Cs-Oct-11.pdf

But then i cant see the need to hassle her for it so quickly.

Buzby

Other things don't add up either. Virgin have never passed customers to Adept, more likely there was a requested change, and Virgin ceased to provide from that point. Do also remember that irrespective of age, a change of supplier will also bring with it a minimum term (anything from a year to 24 months) so this could be a problem down the line too.

macman

And the supplier will have no idea of the age of your mother.

Phones4Chris

Buzby wrote: »

Other things don't add up either. Virgin have never passed customers to Adept, more likely there was a requested change, and Virgin ceased to provide from that point. Do also remember that irrespective of age, a change of supplier will also bring with it a minimum term (anything from a year to 24 months) so this could be a problem down the line too.

Sorry to correct you but yes they have.
The original service was Eurobell which was bought up by VM and then eventually sold off to Adept. This wasn't a cable service, but a BT override service either by using a Eurobell dialler Box, or dialling a 1452 prefix or latterly CPS, now it'll be WLR no doubt.

OP, I would ring Inept telecom and ask for an explanation for the £30, but more to the point, ask to speak to Ian Fishwick (Chief Executive) and give him a piece of your mind about their practice of threatening OAP's with CCJ action. Apparently this type of action isn't uncommon as a bit of googling will reveal.

Buzby

No, I stand by what I said - VM have NEVER passed customers to Adept. You are probably referring to Telewest's purchase of Eurobell, but this was disposed of before the merger of Telewest & NTL (to form VM). From memory, this telephony option was regarded as a mess, as TW did not own the infrastructure, simply rented the lines, and was one of the many disposals before the 'marriage' that eventually formed Virgim Media.