Orange Mobile Nightmare - Please Beware

JuliaFox9

Hello - I'm new to this forum but am in desperate need of help and awareness and really just want to warn everyone out there to be very careful if you choose to open a contract with Orange Mobile.

I'd really like to know if anyone has had a terrible experience with mobile service provider, Orange Mobile - similar to the one detailed below:

On March 27th 2012, I called Orange for the third or fourth time to discuss a previous mishandling of my bill, whereby they charged me significantly more than I had used and had not made my bill available to me in any way so it wasn't until the money left my account that I knew anything about it.

On the above date, I was offered a cheaper tariff for my inconvenience and as an incentive not to take the matter up with a regulatory body; a deal I accepted. I was also offered a £30 contribution from Orange towards my next bill. At this time, a support representative told me she was setting up the direct debit immediately and that the matter should be considered resolved, with no further requirement for my involvement.

As such, I did consider the problem concluded until Friday 20th April 2012 when I discovered that my phone was barred from making outgoing calls and text messages. Upon investigation, I discovered that Orange had failed to ever attempt to contact my bank in setting up a Direct Debit. As such, my phone was cut off for non-payment with absolutely no previous contact of any kind - written or otherwise. The only balance I could see on my online account was the one that Orange had told me to dismiss, agreed to remove and were supposedly planning to replace with an accurate balance.

To be clear I still have not received any contact from Orange with regards to any aspect of my account since my phone call to their service operators at 10.13am on March 27th 2012.

I immediately transferred the outstanding balance from my bank account to Orange but received no confirmation of payment. The following morning (April 21st 2012), with no deduction from my bank account and no service on my phone, I attempted to do so again. Once more I received no proof of payment - I can only assume that I have now paid either twice or not at all. I have also reviewed my previous bill, which reveals that Orange has deducted £25 instead of the promised £30 'apology discount'.

My phone has now been disabled for four days, through no fault of my own and following no attempt of contact from Orange. I have logged on to my account several times during these four days and as of this morning it has been updated to state that my outstanding balance is £0.00. And yet my phone remains out of use.

I have no other way of contacting Orange as all customer service numbers and any other contacts recommended to me have also been barred from my phone, which is my only form of communication aside from online.

I have emailed Orange via Hotmail message, customer service enquiry and via Facebook and Twitter. I am being consistently ignored, though I can only assume someone within the company must be aware that they failed to debit my account, failed to contact me if I needed to do anything to help, and have quite happily now taken my money repeatedly - and over the owed amount - and cancelled my service.

I am not by any means well off and am supporting myself at the edges of my monthly budget. I do not have the kind of funds to be messed around this way but I can't see a way out if I can't even contact Orange.

Has anyone gone through anything similar? I'd love to hear your advice and experiences - I am very much on my own here and need all the help I can get.

Thank you, --Julia.

OneADay

You will have to phone I guess - try 07973 100 439

drbesty

Or you could call the correct number, 07973100150

oopsadaisydoddle

You will need to contact the collections team (can be transferred via the 07973 100 150 operators) and they will lift the restriction on your phone. When you pay the bill, it can take up to 72 hrs for it to lift the bar via the systems - most people call straight through and say "I've paid my bill, can you switch me back on pls?" - of course, you weren't to know that.

Also re the direct debit, I'm not sure how relevant it is to your case but a direct debit will only take effect after the next BILL date on the account, therefore it is possible that this is actually set up.

It is unacceptable that the person you spoke to did not resolve the issue completely. Normally when a credit is applied to an account, a request is made to the collections team via the system to stop any further action because the account is in dispute so to speak and the credit given will be updated when the next bill date ticks over.

When a credit is given, it never actually reflects on the account until the bill after it's applied is produced. When a bill is produced, the system thinks that that is the amount that is owed and cannot understand anything else unless it is told. Therefore in your case, the initial bill was (wrongly) produced and the system recognised that is what you owed (because it doesn't know anything else). You then were given a credit but that doesn't update until your NEXT bill. At this point, the operator you spoke to should have put the account in dispute (due to the credit) which would've stopped your services being restricted until the next bill was updated with the credit on. By this time of course, your direct debit shouldve been sorted too.

Sorry that this doesn't actually help you - hope I haven't confused you either, I was just trying to explain why I think it's happened. It should've been sorted though as I say, and you definitely need to get back on the phone and give them what for!!