You can cancel your Orange contract!

powerful_Rogue

Received the CISAS decision this morning and its great news!

2. The company shall:

a. Write to the customer and confirm that her request to terminate her contract without penalty is accepted and back date this to the date on which notice was given (6 April, plus 14 days i.e. 20 April), waiving all charges incurred on the account after this date.

b. Write a suitably worded letter of apology.

c. Pay the customer compensation in the sum of £100.00.

Got to thank DamePeggy and RandomCurve for their great help in helping to achieve this. Im just dissapointed that you did not have the same success.

From reading the defence, I think there may have been some confusion.

When we emailed Orange, it was during the time when everyone was emailing about the T-Mobile price rise. In their confusion, Orange sent a reply quoting the T-Mobile terms and conditions etc. We included this email in our defence.

The adjucator wrote:

I then come to the matter of the notice. In the defence, the company
states that it wrote a letter on or about 2-9 March 2013 (the company has not provided the copy of that notice and neither has it provided any customer notes demonstrating the same) in which it gave the customer 30 days’ written notice of its intention to increase its prices by 3.3%. I consider this defence date to be in error as, and by reference to the contemporaneously written email dated 23 April 2013, the company states that it wrote between 2 April and 8 April 2013. This was confirmed by the customer in her reply email (email 5) in which the customer notes that the company provided notice between 2 and 8 April 2013, adding that “… The RPI in question would be the one released by the ONS on the 19th March 2013 and was 3.2%. As such you have increased my monthly price plan by 3.3% which is higher than the increase in the RPI…”. I therefore consider this increase to be to the customer’s detriment as per her terms and conditions.

CSales

forgive me for being a ittle bit thick, but when the first price increase was announced in December 2011 I requested to cancel, got my final response and got CISAS involved who said they didn't deal with commercial decisions? I presume this has now changed and I could potentially ask CISAS to look into it again?

RandomCurve

CSales wrote: »

forgive me for being a ittle bit thick, but when the first price increase was announced in December 2011 I requested to cancel, got my final response and got CISAS involved who said they didn't deal with commercial decisions? I presume this has now changed and I could potentially ask CISAS to look into it again?

The above is what makes so angry at Ofcom for not getting involved!

It is all about how you word the claim and very little to do with the actual facts. CISAS can not deal with a business decision - such as that to increase the price, but it CAN deal with how the company applied the price rise.

You may still be able to have your account credited with all sums taken over and above your initial contract price back dated to April 2011, as in my case the adjudicator ruled the price rise clause unenforceable (see my posts #166, #167, and#174).

RandomCurve

powerful_Rogue wrote: »

Received the CISAS decision this morning and its great news!

..... Got to thank DamePeggy and RandomCurve for their great help in helping to achieve this. Im just dissapointed that you did not have the same success.

Your welcome and great news.

I have no idea what the adjudicator is talking about in that quote - but if it means you win then brill :beer:

DamePeggy

powerful_Rogue wrote: »

Received the CISAS decision this morning and its great news!

2. The company shall:

a. Write to the customer and confirm that her request to terminate her contract without penalty is accepted and back date this to the date on which notice was given (6 April, plus 14 days i.e. 20 April), waiving all charges incurred on the account after this date.

b. Write a suitably worded letter of apology.

That is excellent news! Can you let us know a bit more about the adjudication? Was it the change in Ts&Cs or the old terms that led to the decision (or both)?

Cheers!

DamePeggy

CSales wrote: »

forgive me for being a ittle bit thick, but when the first price increase was announced in December 2011 I requested to cancel, got my final response and got CISAS involved who said they didn't deal with commercial decisions? I presume this has now changed and I could potentially ask CISAS to look into it again?

No you're not being thick! I'm not sure what precisely has changed since last year (management, precedent of the T-mobile cases perhaps), but CISAS do seem to have changed their policy.

Tom Forth (https://www.tomforth.co.uk/orange) made a number of complaints to CISAS about their refusal to adjudicate then. CISAS's responses were lame and frankly, pretty illogical, especially as he presented them with one of their own case studies that they used in their publicity material which looked almost identical to these Orange cases.

If you've got the time, give it another go. Perhaps citing these cases and the Tmobile ones as precedent. Good luck.

powerful_Rogue

DamePeggy wrote: »

That is excellent news! Can you let us know a bit more about the adjudication? Was it the change in Ts&Cs or the old terms that led to the decision (or both)?

Cheers!

Hi DamePeggy. I'll post the important bits from the decision.

• In its defence, the company has confirmed that the customer is correct that version 14A of the terms and conditions are applicable. I am therefore very surprised that all the correspondence from the company to the customer in the period leading up to this adjudication has stated that it is version 15 that applied. Clearly there are varying views within the company itself.

• Dealing with the change of index related to the publication of the RPI, I accept the company’s explanation about the change as set out in paragraph 18 of its defence, but I have to add that I am very surprised that in it its terms and conditions (version 14), it referred to a governmental body that did not exist when those terms and conditions came into existence. I therefore consider that the company has failed in its duty of care to the customer in relation to this matter both in the issuance of the terms and conditions and in the period leading to this adjudication by referring to terms and conditions that did not apply to the customer’s account.

• I am mindful that consumer contracts must be in plain, intelligible language. If a consumer challenges a term and it is found to be unclear or ambiguous, the interpretation most favourable to the consumer shall prevail. I therefore consider that there is ambiguity in a) the applicable body noted in the customer’s terms and conditions, and b) the timing of the RPI figure.

• In this instance, the interpretation which is most favourable to the customer would be that the company has a) used the RPI from a body that is not mentioned in the customer’s terms and conditions, and b) increased its prices in excess of the RPI figure as published in March 2013 (i.e. the last of the twelve months before the month in which the notice was sent) and that therefore the customer is entitled to rely upon clause 4.3 of her terms and conditions.

• Conclusion
  15. My conclusion on the main issue is that:
  a. The company has failed in the duty of care which it owed to the customer.
  b. The customer has provided sufficient evidence to justify her claim.

In relation to the mention of RPI, Ive managed to get my head around what has happened. Whilst in conversation with Orange via email, they sent this:

Thank you for your email dated 19 April 2013. I apologise for my delay in responding I have been out of the office.

I apologise if you believe that I did not address your issues however, I have spoken with our Legal Department and confirm our terms and conditions give us the right to increase our price plan charges provided the increase is no higher than RPI and we provide customers with written notice of the change. Clause 7.2.3.3 of our terms state that we will use a statistical measure of RPI' published on a date as close as reasonably possible before the date' we provide our customers with written notice.

We wrote to our customers between 02 April and 08 April 2013 informing them of the changes to their price plan charge. In accordance with our terms and conditions, the relevant measure of RPI should reflect an RPI figure published on a date as close as reasonably possible to the date we provide notice.

The Office of National Statistics published its official rate of RPI for the period 1 April 2012 to 31 March 2013. The official measure of RPI for this period is 3.3%. This is in line with the 3.3% price increase we notified customers of in April to take effect from 10th May.

This means that customers wishing to end their contract with us, in accordance with clause 7.2.3.3, will not have the right to leave without providing us with 30 days notice or paying the cancellation charge that may apply.

Whilst I appreciate this may not be the response you were hoping for, I trust I have explained my reasons behind my decision.

Kind Regards

Caroline Pigg
Executive Office, EE

Now this is the generic email EE was sending to T-Mobile customers at the time, and appears in all the confusion they sent it to my partner in response to her previous email! In our reply, part of our response was:

You stated in your email “our terms and conditions give us the right to increase our price plan charges provided the increase is no higher than RPI and we provide customers with written notice of the change. Clause 7.2.3.3 of our terms state that we will use a statistical measure of RPI' published on a date as close as reasonably possible before the date' we provide our customers with written notice.

We wrote to our customers between 02 April and 08 April 2013 informing them of the changes to their price plan charge. In accordance with our terms and conditions, the relevant measure of RPI should reflect an RPI figure published on a date as close as reasonably possible to the date we provide notice.”

These were not the terms and conditions I agreed to but I will explain anyway. You provided notice of the increase between the 2nd April and the 8th April. Your terms and conditions state you use the RPI published on a date as close as reasonable possible before the date you provide customers with written notice.
The RPI in question would be the one released by the ONS on the 19th March 2013 which was 3.2%. As such you have increased my monthly price plan by 3.3% which is higher than the increase in the RPI and again breached your terms and conditions.

Again, I will ask you to address each point instead of sending out a generic email. Failing that please issue a notice of deadlock.

It was a case of, well if there going to quote the wrong terms and conditions (from the wrong company!) then we will go along with it.

The adjucator has picked up on this and commented:

• Leaving that aside, I then come to the matter of the notice. In the defence, the company states that it wrote a letter on or about 2-9 March 2013 (the company has not provided
  the copy of that notice and neither has it provided any customer notes demonstrating the same) in which it gave the customer 30 days’ written notice of its intention to increase its prices by 3.3%. I consider this defence date to be in error as, and by reference to the contemporaneously written email dated 23 April 2013, the company states that it wrote
  between 2 April and 8 April 2013. This was confirmed by the customer in her reply email (email 5) in which the customer notes that the company provided notice between 2 and 8
  April 2013, adding that “… The RPI in question would be the one released by the ONS on the 19th March 2013 and was 3.2%. As such you have increased my monthly price
  plan by 3.3% which is higher than the increase in the RPI…”. I therefore consider this increase to be to the customer’s detriment as per her terms and conditions.

As such most of the win in based around this. All because IOrange sent an incorrect email with incorrect dates.


Hope that makes sense!

DamePeggy

Thanks for posting. Their conclusion on the wording of Clause 4.3.1. is very promising, although the issue of the muddled response from EE has complicated this.

It’s good to see that your adjudicator took proper mind of the principle that the interpretation that favours the customer must prevail.

I think that the adjudicator for my and RC’s case just got it plain wrong – possibly as he’d backed himself into a corner with my decision before RC’s case arrived. His decision for RC that the clause could not be enforced, but wasn’t sufficient to allow a cancellation, was quite a fudge.
Hopefully my partner’s claim will go to someone nice at CISAS too.

RandomCurve

DamePeggy wrote: »

Thanks for posting. Their conclusion on the wording of Clause 4.3.1. is very promising, although the issue of the muddled response from EE has complicated this.

It’s good to see that your adjudicator took proper mind of the principle that the interpretation that favours the customer must prevail.

I think that the adjudicator for my and RC’s case just got it plain wrong – possibly as he’d backed himself into a corner with my decision before RC’s case arrived. His decision for RC that the clause could not be enforced, but wasn’t sufficient to allow a cancellation, was quite a fudge.
Hopefully my partner’s claim will go to someone nice at CISAS too.

Yes, that does bode well for my sons case too. Lets hope your partner and my son don't get the same adjudicator as us!

I'm still really pleased with my result though as I have been using it as a "battering ram" to try and persuade Ofcom that they need to take retrospective action re price rises as they are unenforceable, and not just banned for future implementation as was widely expected. I have also persuaded my MP to write to Ofcom on this very point so the heat is on them a bit.

I may be being a bit vain, but Ofcom have delayed announcing the results of their price rise consultation and I'd like to think that the delay is in part due to my emails on this matter - although in reality the delay is probably so they can make sure that all of the operators have put through one last price rise before they ban them (cynical me - never).

RandomCurve

Just had an adjudicator appointed to my Sons case - it is some one new - a woman. So back to the waiting game!

Ofcom have confirmed that all they can do is ask for a court to rule on the fairness of the Orange clause, and then the court will decide if it is fair or not, and if it is not fair if Orange have to repay the sums taken already, or just prevent Orange using the clause in the future. Only problem is Ofcom have not decided whether or not to take it to court! I'll keep pushing them, but the more people who email [EMAIL="Lynn.Parker@Ofcom.org.uk"]Lynn.Parker@Ofcom.org.uk[/EMAIL] complaining of the situation the more likely it is they will ask for a court review.