Another NTL non dd charge issue. I need advice!

Vyberman

This is a long story, I beg of you if you can help or know anything about this situation, please read on as I have run out of avenues to explore. All I ask is that you bear with me.

OK. I have been an NTL customer for 7 years.
In November of last year they wrote to me to inform me of this new charge.
I wrote back to them in December to complain about this charge.
It was a three-page letter, to shorten it my points were:

• 1: I was a long-standing customer with an existing contract. While this contract did say that my charges were subject to change (i.e. they could put them up from time to time) there was nothing in this contract that said they could invent a new charge and add that to my bill.
• 2: There was NO WAY I would EVER pay this charge! I was very clear on this point and repeated it several times. The bottom line being that if they intended to try and charge me then I would terminate my account immediately!

I then waited for this complaint to be dealt with.
1 month later (Jan) I got a letter saying they had received my complaint and would deal with it as soon as possible. Better late than never I guess!

In the mean time I was paying all of my bills on time and in full, apart from the non direct debit surcharge which I withheld...obviously!
So the ball was no in their court. They had received my complaint and knew of my intentions to leave unless it was sorted to my satisfaction.

A couple of months later (Feb.) On the same day as receiving my monthly bill I got a threatening letter from their debt management team. I found this quite insulting as I was paid up to date apart from about £16, which was the accumulated non-direct debit charge. They wanted me to call them so obviously I did. Not to sort out paying the bill but to tell them to !!!!!! off and leave me alone as this £16 was subject to an ongoing complaint. It was clear to me that this was down to the two departments not communicating with each other.
I also needed to speak about my bill (now £56, £35 of which is advance charges for my internet)
The bill was incomplete (last page only) and the charges had gone up. A penny on my service charge and £1 on the non-DD charge. Since I had no prior warning this was a breach of my statutory rights!!!

The penny on my service charge I wasn’t bothered about, and wasn’t even that worried about the fact not telling me was illegal. On issuing of an accurate and complete bill I would pay my service charges as usual.

So I called basically to tell the debt management team that they were mishandling the account. If they were to contact the complaints team then they would know that this £16 is subject to a complaint that they had not yet looked at.


Before the conversation had ended they had cut my internet off!!!! :mad:

Bearing in mind that the Internet charges are charged in advance. I called them back; clearly they had made a mistake. I wasn’t in arrears on my account; I hadn’t even been billed properly for the coming month. And they were now all fully aware of the situation with the surcharge and the complaint.

They were extremely rude to me and told me I had a bad debt and therefore would not reconnect me until I had paid the bill...IN FULL!!!
I went over everything that had been said, time and time again with the muppet on the phone, asked to speak to his superiors etc etc.
they were all as unhelpful.

The bottom line was that they now wanted me to pay them in advance for a service that I don’t even have!!!

This is not they way I expect to be treated after 7 years of trouble free custom!

I called the trading standards office.
They told me they couldn’t help. The charges had been looked into and were deemed to be legal..."at the moment" were his words.
I asked him about the breach of contract? It may be legal to pass the charges on to new customers, but I have a contract! And an ongoing complaint that was being ignored.

They said again, they can’t help me but gave me the number for Otelo.
I called Otelo. They said that they could not help me, as this was not a consumer issue. It was a commercial issue and Otelo could only deal with consumer issues.

I called the office of fair-trading. They can’t help me. They only deal with big general things and don’t look at specific cases. So I tell them that maybe they should look at the fact many people cant pay by DD as the banks wont let them (I have a basic bank account which is next to useless) They then charge companies for non-DD transactions and know full well this will generate revenue for them as they know there are millions of folk, like me, whom they don’t allow to use DD!!! Is that not engineering a false market type thing?

But in the mean time where did that leave me?

No choice but to call the muppets who were supposed to be dealing with my complaint. 20 minutes going round in circles with the person, who answered the phone, I eventually ask to speak to someone in charge.

I get put onto someone who was supposedly in charge, but he sounded like an idiot to me. It seemed to me that his objectives were to push me to a point where I became abusive so he could hang up.
I refrained from this, which was hard to do.
At one stage he told me I was lucky they didn’t stick 2 years worth of backdated charges on my account, which they had the right to do. This was little more than a threat as far as I am concerned. I do not believe for a moment that other customers have been getting charged for non-DD payments for two years.

And I most certainly do not respond well to threats.

I pushed the issue of my complaint in December of last year. He now told me that they had absolutely no record of ever having received a complaint.

Oh really? Because I have here a letter from NTL acknowledging receipt of my complaint! Albeit a month after the complaint was made, but non the less it is proof that a complaint was made.

What I didn’t tell him was that this now made it a consumer issue. So now Otelo could be of some help.

I called Otelo back. As I thought, they told me they could help as I have tried to complain and got nowhere.
They told me to issue NTL\virgin with a letter. This letter was to cover everything that had happened and by outlining what I want done about it. Those things are as follows

• That I wanted to end my account, as I no longer wish to deal with them
• That the account balance is to be reduced to zero as I wont pay for a service I hadn’t had, and had objected from the word go about the non DD charge. The arrears were their fault for ignoring that objection for so long.
• That I want written confirmation that my details would not be passed on to any credit blacklist and my credit rating would not be affected in any way
• That they had 10 days to comply with my terms or issue a dead lock letter

I sent this letter by registered mail.

I received a standard letter, almost exactly the same as the one they sent in Jan, stating that they had received my complaint and that they would deal with it within 5 days. (This letter arrived 2 weeks after I sent mine)

It has been more than 5 days since they sent this letter and I have heard nothing. Apart from getting a new bill which is now £96. Again they have added another advance charge for an Internet service that I don’t have.

I have also received a letter from a debt collection agency in Manchester saying they will obtain a warrant to seize good etc etc.

So I contacted Otelo and informed them that I had followed their instructions and got nowhere, would they please now step in and help me to resolve this situation?

I got a letter back from Otelo yesterday. Guess what? They can’t help me!!!:mad: :mad: :mad:

Apparently NTL are no longer a member of their group or some other such nonsense. So thanks to Otelo and their rubbish advice I am now deeper in debt than I was before and left up the creek without a paddle.

Where the hell do you go when the ombudsman themselves say they are powerless to deal with a certain company?
Indeed who do I turn to and tell about the fact that the ombudsman has actually added to my problems?

Does anyone know anyway whatsoever I can get help with this problem?
I know I am right, I know I have rights and I know that they have no right to ask me for any money, let alone hound me.

I just don’t know how to enforce my rights, as there seems to be no place left to turn.

The other question I have is does anyone know what date it was when they introduced the non-DD charge? This would at least help me know if the guy from complaints was lying in order to make his empty threats.

Rawhide_2

Sounds like you are being led on a maddening trial.

Perhaps you need to get some legal advice, either from local CAB, or if it looks like the bailiffs are likely to knocking on the door - from a recommended solicitor.

If you think you could defend your situation robustly, and are prepared to take the personal risk, you could always phone the NTL / Virgin complaint team and inform them that matters have reached a situation where you have no other option other than to pursue the matter in the small claims court, on the grounds of their unreasonable harrassment. Unless they are prepared to have a rational examination of facts and reach a satisfactory settlement over the phone. Google small claims court and see what options you have.

In the same way that one can e-mail CEO of CPW C Dunstone, have a look to see if there is a route to get a polite, succinct e-mail through to Sir Richard appealing to his better nature, He seems like a reasonable bloke.

Just some random thoughts, good luck

ZXCVBNM_3

Sorry cant say much to help you - but i do have an old NTL bill from Feb 2006 whereby the non-DD handling chrge was £2 - since Virgin have taken over now increased to £5 - see told you it was Virgin on the ridiculous

tess1959

Hi, My first time here. Am being charged £5 mth cos I dont use DD to pay my bill. Have been with them for 7 years, but when I asked to change to a cheaper tariff with 8mb broadband which was advertised on their site at £14.99, was told this was only for new customers and I would have to continue to pay the £23 mth. Am not paying the charge and have run up a debt of £15 so far. Would change to DD to avoid the charge but am worried that they will take this overdue debt without my authorisation. Sorry if this is in the wrong place but being new to the site, not sure how to place a new post. Bear with me. Might check out the Watchdog form tho. Many thanks for reading this. Tess

royal2mail

hi i have raised this matter with virgin in the past but say the charge covers the use of admin staff. they have just started e billing payment over the nett. but yes they still say that there is still this £5 fee.
as like most i pay a number of bills on the nett and have not been charged for this service so were are they coming from.awaiting reply will post when this arrives

normanmark

Is there a reason why you don't have a direct debit set up? Direct Debit offers more protection for your payments. Plus it saves the hassle of the £5 charge. To be honest it's pointless sending a letter, a massive company aren't going to move the goal posts for one person.

I at first was quite against this but looking at the advantages of using a direct debit I didn't hesitate to switch to that format of paying.

dazco

normanmark wrote: »

Is there a reason why you don't have a direct debit set up? Direct Debit offers more protection for your payments. Plus it saves the hassle of the £5 charge. To be honest it's pointless sending a letter, a massive company aren't going to move the goal posts for one person.

I at first was quite against this but looking at the advantages of using a direct debit I didn't hesitate to switch to that format of paying.

Nice sentiments norman, but we are dealing with Virgin Media here. Quite simply the worst people in the world at putting bills together. Every one of my bills since the takeover has been wrong (and the virgin rep always screams that they are right, then digs deeper and findfa the problem) and I refuse to give them permission to delve willy nilly into my bank account and leave it short for other DDs and me open to lots of £35 bank charges.

normanmark

Well instruct your bank then that Virgin should not be taking any more than that amount each month.

I've had bill issues too, but to be honest they were sorted on the phone within 5 minutes of me calling up, so i can't really complain!