iii introducing quarterly £20 charge

a&akay

Response to my formal complaint via secure messaging. Time will tell.

'We are sorry but due to an administrative error, your Interactive Investor account was not fully closed. As a result, our quarterly charge of £20 was inadvertently collected from your Debit Card on 1 October 2012.
We are processing a refund back to your bank account which you will receive in the next 7 days. Your account will then be fully closed and we assure you that this error will not recur.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.'

chazza

a&akay wrote: »

Response to my formal complaint via secure messaging. Time will tell.

'We are sorry but due to an administrative error, your Interactive Investor account was not fully closed. As a result, our quarterly charge of £20 was inadvertently collected from your Debit Card on 1 October 2012.
We are processing a refund back to your bank account which you will receive in the next 7 days. Your account will then be fully closed and we assure you that this error will not recur.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.'

shouldn’t your account be closed down? as in you can't access it to send secure messages?. when I complained again, they closed my account down, so I can't access it – e.g. can’t send secure messages etc. Not sure what stops you getting charged though, maybe it’s a separate system.

lisyloo

Rather than wait 10 days and continue incurring charges, I have disputed the transaction with my bank and have been told they will put the £20 back.

If you do a chargeback, you still need to make sure the account is closed down with iii, otherwise you may get charged in future.

rail.link

lisyloo wrote: »

If you do a chargeback, you still need to make sure the account is closed down with iii, otherwise you may get charged in future.

Yes, hence the formal letter of complaint.

Though I'm not sure if it matters whether it's closed or not, as long as they continue to keep your debit card details on their system ?

CautiousWithMoney

Argh, they've just charged me the £20 too and I need to claw it back!

I didn't close the account down as I was considering using it again after selling all my shares about 6 months ago. I didn't think they'd grab the £20 from my debit card! Surely they can't do this as I never authorised it?

I really don't feel that this is treating their customers fairly...

JohnRo

It's hard to fathom how a firm with such a well polished web presence could possibly have made such a complete pigs ear of this charging transition and their internal handling of it.

theGrinch

I received an email from them admitting an error and they will reverse the charge. hope others will hear soon.

completely agree. this is a real balls up from an otherwise satisfactory company.

tonyhamm

iii.co.uk advertised no charges on the account, so I signed up, but then forgot all about it and didn't log in again.

Despite no activity in the account, I find 2 £20 payments have been made without my consent from my bank account.

Communication of impending charges; No Letters or Emails from iii.co.uk.

I, like other posters, have double checked and received no emails warning me of any forthcoming charges on the account.

I certainly have received no letters in the post which one normally gets with other financial service providers, banks etc.. saying the terms and conditions and fees have changed and to exkect them to apply from net month or quarter or so.

I do not think I have been dealt with in good faith or in a fair way by iii.co.uk. I am pretty shocked. I have complained and remain to see if they refund me or if I have to take it further with the OFT and FOS.

lisyloo

Though I'm not sure if it matters whether it's closed or not, as long as they continue to keep your debit card details on their system ?

Well there are no guarantees with this bunch of clowns.
What I was trying to say (to the general audience) was that if you get the £20 back via your bank but the iii account is still active then they'll keep charging every quarter.
If you go through the bank for the most recent payment, then you still need to ask iii to close down your account to stop future payments.
In theory they should do so. If you get it in writing (or email) then you should be covered.
I don't think any of us could guarantee agaisnt future mistakes.

The point I was making (to everyone) was that a chargeback through the bank does nothing at all to future payments if you have an active and cahrgeable subscription with the company.

A chargeback only sorts out a one-off payment, not recurring future charges.
I hope that makes it clear.

Optimist

III are sending messages to my closed trading account I assume it is about the £20 they have taken but as I can no longer access said account it confirms my decision to leave........Sigh.....