Utility Warehouse (Telecom Plus) Discussion

baxterdwall

My wife uses Telecom Plus she phones her meter reading through regularly each month and their has never been a problem.

wheresmydoshat

strangely enough uw's standard dd for us had us in debt almost instantly, if i hadn't noticed we'd already owe them £100's and i've only been with them a few months.

1carminestocky

wheresmydoshat wrote: »

strangely enough uw's standard dd for us had us in debt almost instantly, if i hadn't noticed we'd already owe them £100's and i've only been with them a few months.

In my (embarrassingly extensive ) experience of energy suppliers they all seem to do this. But unlike the other suppliers you do have a choice with UW without it costing you anything - opt out of the budget plan and just pay for exactly what you use each month (well 1 month in arrears to be exact). It's effectively similar to paying by cheque/standing order without the financial penalty that would involve with the Big 6.

NigeWick

wheresmydoshat wrote: »

strangely enough uw's standard dd for us had us in debt almost instantly, if i hadn't noticed we'd already owe them £100's and i've only been with them a few months.

That's a bit peculiar. Most companies over estimate their "estimates" as that means they have more of your money to earn interest on. You could have saved it to earn yourself interest and then paid the bill when the company asked for the money.


I am an independent distributor with Utility Warehouse and the opinions I express are my own and may not be the same as the company's.

1carminestocky

You must have been with UW for too long, Nige , as in my recent experience with just about all the Big 6 they tend to try and get you on a low monthly DD at first. It can't be co-incidence as it's happened too many times to me (I always had to request a HIGHER DD than they suggested). My thinking is they do it in order to get you 'bedded in' during the first few months and thus effevtively stopping you from switching away due to the fact that within a short space of time there's a debit balance on the account. Nice thing about the opt out option with UW is this should never be an issue.

We've had our cash back card for approx 5 days now and already spent £150 on it (just on stuff we would normally have bought on our debit card, btw). That's £7.50 (gross) off the UW bill already :money:. The cheapest g&e tariff (websaver3) works out at £3.17 per week cheaper on our usage (but of course we are negating a lot of that by getting the phone/bb/calls package as well). Emailed CS twice with queries and responded with the answer within 24 hours both times. Very impressed so far but of course it is still early days.

PS As a committed money saver I'm embarrassed to admit my combined monthly total for BB, phone and calls for last month (before I joined UW) came to a not inconsiderable £41! £15 to Sky and £26-odd to BT. Crackers.

Cardew

1carminestocky wrote: »

You must have been with UW for too long, Nige , as in my recent experience with just about all the Big 6 they tend to try and get you on a low monthly DD at first. It can't be co-incidence as it's happened too many times to me (I always had to request a HIGHER DD than they suggested). .

I actually agree with Carmine about the initial low DD.

Although IMO it is more to 'lure' naive customers with a reduced unrealistic DD, rather than to 'trap and retain' them by getting them to run up a large debit balance.

1carminestocky

Cardew wrote: »

I actually agree with Carmine about the initial low DD.

Although IMO it is more to 'lure' naive customers with a reduced unrealistic DD, rather than to 'trap and retain' them by getting them to run up a large debit balance.

Crikey. :eek::D

IME the DD amount I'm talking about is the one that was suggested/recommended after I'd already signed up, though, so not sure it could be seen as a 'lure'.

But, anyway, at least we agree on one thing. I'd call that progress.

(Actually, we also agree on the fact that the utilities should still be nationalised so that's actually 2 things. Yes?).

NigeWick

1carminestocky wrote: »

Emailed CS twice with queries and responded with the answer within 24 hours both times. Very impressed so far but of course it is still early days.

I hope the company does not disappoint you. Apparently the move to new premises went smoothly and they have plenty of space to house more staff as required in the call centre etc.

janninew

I don't know why the company get such a bad press on here for customer service, I've always been really impressed with how they deal with problems. Calls answered quickly by a person I can understand, and e-mails responded to in the first 24 hours at the most! I'm a happy customer, but then perhaps i've just been lucky!

1carminestocky

NigeWick wrote: »

I hope the company does not disappoint you. Apparently the move to new premises went smoothly and they have plenty of space to house more staff as required in the call centre etc.

I hope so, too. Like I say, early impressions are extemely favourable. BTW, I have never ever received so much paper work from any company (energy supplier or any other) before! :eek: I have leaflets/guides etc etc everywhere!! :eek::D It really is very comprehensive stuff.

As a side note, after much deliberation we decided to go with the unlimited broadband package as our eldest starts Uni in Sept but will remain at home and we envisage lots of downloading relating to his course so thought it prudent to err on the side of caution with our package. I was very impressed with the hardware they sent - the very latest (version 5) model of the netgear wireless router which supports push and connect technology coupled with the netgear USB wireless adapter which supports the same technology. Very very easy set up. Ideal for a luddite like myself. I was surprised at the quality of the hardware, TBH