Orange not honouring upgrade....where do I stand?

jaydith

Hi I have a bit of a dilemma and was wondering where I stand with all of this...

My partner is an Orange customer of 10 years. (PAYG and contract).
We decided to go down the early upgrade route due to her phone finally giving up the ghost. We spoke to customer services who told us to downgrade our contract to the cheapest tariff (£8 per month) and he would give us a ring the following month (the billing date when this tariff would become active) to arrange an early upgrade as the early upgrade fee would be cheaper from the date the lower tariff price would become active...

We spoke a month later. The deal he offered us was:
Unltd Text
Unltd Mins
250mb Data (with an additional 1GB for being under 25???)
All for £22 a month

Excellent! Asked him how much early upgrade fee was....
In the region of £60.
Then asked what phones were available. I was then amazed when he said I could have a new Samsung Galaxy S4 and all I had to pay was £20 on top of my early upgrade fee. I asked him to go ahead with this deal but then it started to go off on a tangent when he said he would have to ask his supervisor to process this, then he'd give me a ring the following day to speak to his "mate" who could put this deal through.

Did not receive call backs from him. Spoke to different members of the upgrade team who said that this deal had expired and he shouldn't be offering me this, or that deal didn't exist and they can't offer it to me as there are no records of me speaking to this guy and nothing on the file?!?!?!? Also keep being passed around different departments at Orange when I try to ring them for answers, or I have advisers on the end of the line pretending that they cannot hear me and hang up?!??!

I have all the details written down and even the original person's ext number. Where do I stand with what he is offering me and now my phone calls to him not even being on record or written in the notes????

(SORRY FOR THE RANT) :mad:

lufcgirl

I have just finished working for this exact department within Orange and we got this type of call a lot!

They won't honour the deal, even if they say about listening to a recording of the call all it will be is a training issue about the advisor offering the incorrect deal. Which does unfortunately happen.

Early upgrades aren't subject to any form of loyalty offer, unless you have for example a 10% 'for life' discount which would carry on. £22 a month and the deal you've mentioned sounds like the Works 26 (which would be £26p/m), and an S4 on that plan was about £200 on top of the upgrade fee.

I'd call back, speak to someone else and get the correct offers available. Sorry it's not the good news you're expecting but it will be what will happen.

jaydith

Have now rung Orange again and the advisor has told me that this deal is not possible as to get the phone for free would be £46 per month contract!
And I shouldn't have been downgraded to an £8 per month contract as I've been downgraded 3 tariffs which shouldn't have been possible??

What happens with the complaints procedure? I'm thinking of going down this route as the customer service has been appalling and was wondering whether they take any relelvant action and what becomes of it?

Buzby

Offers come and go - whilst you may justly feel aggrieved, Orange and T-Mobile are about to disappear and offers and deals can disappear within the hour when quotas are met or budgets reached. Retention offers are not long term offers, if you like what is offered - you take it there and then.

Pineapple88

What are you hoping to acheive from the complaints procedure?

I expect that you will get an apology and they will assure you that the adviser will be spoken to/training issue would be raised. You would not hear anything further than this as its an internal training issue. The most I think you can expect in monetary terms is a gesture of goodwill in the region of £10/£20 for misinformation/bad service. They will not agree to offer you the tariff, their t&c's probably say that an offer can be withdrawn at any time, and there was no contract between you and the adviser. He made an offer which has now been retracted- they do not have to honour the offer.

If I were in your position I would be careful about how far too push it. If Orange were to play hardball they could say 'We're very sorry you were wrongly advised about our price plans Mr. Jaydith, we will correct it now and amend your tariff to one two rates higher and back bill you for the months you have underpaid'.

Also having worked in call centres (not for Orange) its not always the case that complaining will get you further. Sometimes the customer service adviser (who has targets to meet) will be willing to bend the rules far more than the manager (who does not have targets).