Utility Warehouse (Telecom Plus) Discussion

Cardew

ThrobsBlackHat wrote: »

I

Why make it personal?

That's his style with everyone - classic troll behaviour and you are doing exactly what he wants - getting defensive to his attacks.

Wise advice above, please don't feed The Troll.

Many of us have him on our ignore list and only see his posts when they are quoted.

pmacs123

well i'm a exec distrubutor and think its good for people to make changes, the uw only has 1% of the market, you benifit from having more than 2 services to get free calls. on land linephone, free evening and weekends or free 24/7 when you phone others on the uw. as it says one bill, we were on british gas and they could not even set up a direct debit, in the 12 month of trying.. and in the end wanted my partner to pay her ex's hubby's settlement bill because he moved else were, and she aint been with him for 3 yrs, funny old world eh,
keep shopping around, and also make sure you give your suplier regulor meter readings to avoid any shocks........

leesheff

Blimey!!!!!!:mad:

This is my first post ever on here. I looked the thread up because I had been approached by someone who was a representative of UW. I wanted to know what other people thought so I could decide for myself what to do.
All I have mostly found is a pile of (eloquent at times I'll grant) pedantic, argumentative, bullying, childish and irritating commentary. Where every word has to be placed so carefully as not to be torn apart (as far as I can see) by some of the most self rightious and over inflated ego's I have ever come accross in internet forums!!!
Do you people have nothing better to do than rush to your in-boxes clutching your thesaurus' - desperate to force your will over anyone who disagree's by the tiniest percentage to your view of the world?
Saying that I'm glad your all on here and not peddling your negative commentary in the REAL world.
I can't belive how mad it has made me
There are REAL issues going on - right now. People are loosing their jobs, their homes and buisnesses and yet to see all this intellegence put to use like this is distressing and in no way in the spirit of this (otherwise) very informative and helpfull website.
I'm absolutely non the wiser r.e. UW. I can say it's cheaper than the suppliers I have got (Mind you I should have changed suppliers ages ago).
Looking at the comments I can also say I could probably find better deals than UW. What I do know is that this thread drags down an otherwise excellent website!

Quentin

pmacs123 wrote: »

well i'm a exec distrubutor and think its good for people to make changes, the uw only has 1% of the market, you benifit from having more than 2 services to get free calls. on land linephone, free evening and weekends ........

How would you possibly see the benefit of the "free" calls you advertise if to get them you have to take at least 3 services and pay your monthly membership fee as well?

You can get "free" calls from other phone providers simply by getting your line rental from them - no monthly club fee to pay, as well as no expensive utilities to buy - and only the uw makes you pay a minimum monthly call charge!

cymru78

Hi,
I'm pretty sure this is my post in this thread. I'm not going to read all 49 pages to find out.

I've been a customer of UW for a couple of years now. Their gas and electricity prices are not as good as they were, but who's are?
Infact, I owe money on Electric but this is partly my own fault for not having my payments high enough.
I am about £90 credit on Gas at the moment and I have reduced this payment.

As well as energy, I use their broadcall services too and I think their broadband is great and if when I have phoned customer service, they have been 1st class every time.
Because of the four services, I get free phone calls 24/7 and to many countries too. Not just for 3 months or for weekends like other suppliers do, but for as long as I have four services.
It's also a great help having everything on just one bill and one payment coming out at the same time each month.

I admit I've been disappointed at my bills lately, but I imagine I would be just as disappointed no matter what provider I was with.
I would also be downhearted if I had to pay for phone calls to (local, national & some international only)

Steffan

My mum's just had her latest bill through for Elec, Gas and Phone and the Elec bill says were £500 in credit, and Gas £60 in credit, to me this seems excessive. We phoned them up today and they said all they could do was reduce the monthly payment, however my mum would rather have her money in her account which is something they flat out refused to do. Is this allowed or do we have a leg to stand on to get the money refunded?

espresso

Steffan wrote: »

My mum's just had her latest bill through for Elec, Gas and Phone and the Elec bill says were £500 in credit, and Gas £60 in credit, to me this seems excessive. We phoned them up today and they said all they could do was reduce the monthly payment, however my mum would rather have her money in her account which is something they flat out refused to do. Is this allowed or do we have a leg to stand on to get the money refunded?

Why not simply switch to a cheaper supplier (not hard to find) and get the money back?

Quentin

Steffan wrote: »

my mum would rather have her money in her account which is something they flat out refused to do. Is this allowed or do we have a leg to stand on to get the money refunded?

Espresso's solution is good advice.

If you have a credit showing at the bottom of a bill, their contract conditions (which she will have agreed to when joining them) do say it's not refundable unless you completely cease being their customer.

The only customers who can get credits refunded are those not on their "budget plan". If she isn't on the budget plan, and the next bill total is expected to be less than the total credit, then she does have a leg to stand on, and should now demand they refund her.

Cardew

leesheff wrote: »

Blimey!!!!!!:mad:

This is my first post ever on here. I looked the thread up because I had been approached by someone who was a representative of UW. I wanted to know what other people thought so I could decide for myself what to do.
All I have mostly found is a pile of (eloquent at times I'll grant) pedantic, argumentative, bullying, childish and irritating commentary. Where every word has to be placed so carefully as not to be torn apart (as far as I can see) by some of the most self rightious and over inflated ego's I have ever come accross in internet forums!!!
Do you people have nothing better to do than rush to your in-boxes clutching your thesaurus' - desperate to force your will over anyone who disagree's by the tiniest percentage to your view of the world?
Saying that I'm glad your all on here and not peddling your negative commentary in the REAL world.
I can't belive how mad it has made me
There are REAL issues going on - right now. People are loosing their jobs, their homes and buisnesses and yet to see all this intellegence put to use like this is distressing and in no way in the spirit of this (otherwise) very informative and helpfull website.
I'm absolutely non the wiser r.e. UW. I can say it's cheaper than the suppliers I have got (Mind you I should have changed suppliers ages ago).
Looking at the comments I can also say I could probably find better deals than UW. What I do know is that this thread drags down an otherwise excellent website!

An eloquent first post if I may say so!

You have very clearly defined the problem, perhaps you have the solution?

Allow UW reps to have a free hand? - or not?

If you wish to find out about UW, may I suggest you ask pointed and specific questions giving no opportunity for obfuscation.

Decado23

Quentin wrote: »

... lots of stuff...

Just wanted to thank you for highlighting a few potential concerns. I'm new to UW and to be honest not 100% expert on all the small print.

I can't speak for all UW reps but I have made a personal commitment to myself that I will not intentionally mislead any potential customer or give any kind of hard sell - better to lose a bit of commission than my self respect.

With that and the points you raised in mind I have now had a chance to discuss UW further with my second prospective customer (the first being me) - my mother...

Before I'd finished the first sentence, she informed me "I trust you implicitly and I know you wouldn't knowingly sell me anything dodgy." This, of course, just made me more determined to make sure she knew exactly what she was getting in to.

To be honest, her reactions to the possible concerns I raised with her were no big surprise to me but I feel happier now I've made it all clear.

Regarding the 'triple value guarantee' I explained that in any given month it's possible, even likely that there will be cheaper options elsewhere. On past experience those options aren't likely to remain the cheapest for long but you can save more money if you want to switch regularly.

My mother "can't be doing with all that" - she's happy to settle for a reasonable price in the long term rather than a cheaper price in the short term. Many on this board will think this foolish but there are a large number of people out there in this position (I read somewhere, maybe this site, maybe elsewhere, that about 13 million homes are still on british gas standard rates).

I also explained the risks highlighted previously regarding the cashback card:

She is satisfied that the risk of losing out due to UW going bust can be mitigated somewhat by limiting the amount on the card at any given time. In her case she will be saving in the region of £20 per month - with no more than £100 or so on the card at any given time (with occasional exceptions for one off large purchases, for which I've advised her to top up on the day she intends to buy and not before) UW would need to go bust within the next 5-6 months for her to loss to outway her gains.

With regards to consumer protection if a purchase 'goes south', I have informed her of the risk but she is confident that this is unlikely to be a problem in the stores she is likely to use the cards at (predominately Sainsbury, some argos, mothercare etc.) and if there is a problem, these major stores are usually willing to settle minor disputes in the customer's favour rather than lose a customer. I've advised her previously (and now reminded) to always use her credit card if shopping online, especially if it's not a supplier she's 100% confident in (not that I'm sure she could shop online without asking my sister or myself for help anyway).

Without going in to any specifics I told her that I've read comments from dissatisfied customers both on this board and elsewhere. She's well aware that very few companies can claim to please all the people all the time "you pays yer money and you takes yer chance" she's willing to give them a try.

I've also pointed out the £50 termination fee if she cancels the home phone (or was it broadcall - sorry, don't have details handy. will edit later for accuracy) within the first year. She's decided to take the optimistic view that this is only a problem if she wants to cancel in the first year, which she may well not.

now all that remains is for me to go through her Virgin bill with her to asses whether her potential phone/internet savings outweigh the £6.50 (i think) extra cost for virgin TV without the phone discount.


Sorry that was all a bit long, wanted to get it off my chest. Thanks again for helping me to be the ethical salesman that I want to be.

To Steffan, Sorry to hear things aren't going so well for you, I hope it is resolved satisfactorily. I can't really comment on the specifics of your case (because, basically, I know !!!!!! all about it). I can say the budget plan (and this is the same or similar across all suppliers I've personally used) intentionally overcharges during the summer months to cover additional usage over winter. £500 in credit does sound a little excessive but there's not much advice I can give except for future reference - submit regular meter readings to improve the accuracy of future usage estimates. If you think you're paying too much, pick up the phone straight away!

Anyway, thanks for giving us a heads up on this possible pitfall and good luck.