Mobile Phone Contract - Price Rise Refunds

RandomCurve

Has anybody else spotted the obvious mistake in Del ot9s defence from EE ? The defence they have sent relates to the Change in T&Cs and has nothing to with the price rise! Can you confirm you sent the price rise case ? Also if you took out your contract after 30 October 2012 you are on a V59 of the contract (I assume you are on T-Mobile). Not sure where to go with this either EE are more incredibly inept than I thought, or they are fiendishly clever!

V58 is the hardest case to win on the T&C change, but the easiest case to win on the price rise. Have EE made this blunder deliberately?

I think the best option is to show the adjudicator how inept EE are. An alternative is to switch this onto T&C hangs - which is what I would have recommended had EE not be falsely claiming that you are on V58.

WraithGR

RC - Not sure I follow your comment at all. What is V58? [edit--Nevermind, just saw it.]
Also, doesn't point 31 in their response address the price rise?

I should think the immediate counter is that GC 9.6 does not in fact determine what constitutes materiality but instead mentions that any price increase would be of material detriment. Despite the fact that Ofcom has issued a clarification of GC9.6 that is intended to be applied to contracts starting after a certain date, the start date of the contract has no bearing on whether a price increase is or is not of material detriment. I'd then also re-state the EU directive to which GC 9.6 is a response and note that the intention is that any price increase, not being neutral or beneficial, should be considered to be of material detriment.

Another possible tack might be: The price increase enacted by EE is a percentage increase. When rendered in absolute terms this increase may appear immaterial, however mobile phone expenses are only a part of total household expenses. If the same percentage increase was applied to total household income the change would be considered material on absolute terms. Therefore the change should be considered material when considered against the cost of the mobile phone contract itself.


I only sent my CISAS request on the 13th so I expect it will be sometime in June before I get EE's response. When I get it I'll post up what I plan to write in response, perhaps you can comment on that..

Just to note that I am not legally trained and probably have less experience than RC in these kinds of matters so if RC disagrees I'd go with his suggestion!

Shaunyboy

Mikmonken wrote: »

Mine came exactly a week after i submitted so you should hear from them on Friday, unless you've not even had the initial post submission email confirmation in which case it may not have gone through.

Spot on. :beer:

Reply from CISAS today.

EE have until 2/6/14 to respond to my claim.:A

delboy9

RandomCurve wrote: »

Has anybody else spotted the obvious mistake in Del ot9s defence from EE ? The defence they have sent relates to the Change in T&Cs and has nothing to with the price rise! Can you confirm you sent the price rise case ? Also if you took out your contract after 30 October 2012 you are on a V59 of the contract (I assume you are on T-Mobile). Not sure where to go with this either EE are more incredibly inept than I thought, or they are fiendishly clever!

V58 is the hardest case to win on the T&C change, but the easiest case to win on the price rise. Have EE made this blunder deliberately?

I think the best option is to show the adjudicator how inept EE are. An alternative is to switch this onto T&C hangs - which is what I would have recommended had EE not be falsely claiming that you are on V58.

Hi RC, I am with t mobile, yes I sent the price rise template and my contract started 24th April 2013. What do you recommend I do now?

Thanks

RandomCurve

WraithGR wrote: »

RC - Not sure I follow your comment at all. What is V58? [edit--Nevermind, just saw it.]
Also, doesn't point 31 in their response address the price rise? .....

The point is this defence is EXACTLY the SAME as the defence EE have used in regards to the change in T&Cs - see post #1424


https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/65353560#Comment_65353560


EE have sent a defence that addresses the change in T&Cs and have NOT addressed any of the points raised in the Price rise case. That is what is strange.

RandomCurve

delboy9 wrote: »

Hi RC, I am with t mobile, yes I sent the price rise template and my contract started 24th April 2013. What do you recommend I do now?

Thanks

I think we should stick with the price rise, pretend we know nothing about the T&C cases and ask the adjudicator to rule on the case you presented.


Can I check one more thing (and this is important) - when you submitted your claim did you included the paragraphs relating to the fact that in 2013 EE applied the March RPI of 3.3%? Sorry 2 more things - how much compensation did you claim? According to EE you asked for £100 again suggests they have copied and pasted a TC defence - and have they got the right account and name on the defence?


From the timing of the contract you should not have included it, but as EE are under the impression you are on V58 it will make a difference.

RandomCurve

Below is the response I would send to EEs defence. I do think EE have messed up here and I think the adjudicator will ask EE to submit a new defence (what a fair system this is!!!). If The adjudicator does go on to make a decision based on the facts to hand I think EE will soon be changing their defence position.


Good Luck DelBoy9 - copy and paste all of the below into a response email/document (you may need to edit paragraph 36 if you claimed more than £100 compensation):




This defence clearly demonstrates EEs lack of care when dealing with this matter as it contains fundamental flaws – I will address these by Paragraph.

I also note that EE have declined to comment on:

• If the EE new and T&C effective 26th March is subject to the clarified Ofcom definition of Material Detriment effective from 23rd January
• If a change in price above CPI represents a real terms increase – which is therefore of Material Detriment under GC 9.6 regardless of which Ofcom definition is used
• If Ofcom have only clarified the definition of Material Detriment and not the actual wording of GC 9.6 the definition applies to all contracts.
  In accordance with the rules of the adjudication scheme I request that the adjudicator only considers my evidence when reaching a decision on these points.
  

Paragraph 4-7 & 24 (contract term 2.11)
These paragraphs clearly state that I took out my contract on 24th April 2013, and confirm that was via EEs own telesales force, but EE then go on to say that I am on version V58 of the contract, this is simply not true. T-Mobile updated their terms and conditions on 30th October 2012 a full One Hundred and Seventy Six (176) days BEFORE I entered into my contract and I submit a copy of V59 of the contract which proves that I must be on V59. This is clear evidence of the lack of duty of care that EE has applied in its dealings with me and I cannot be held responsible for EEs inability to train its own staff to record the correct contract versions on its customer database. Also the contact states that I am able to rely on the contract as published on EEs website (clause 2.11) which is what I have done, even if EE seem unable to do the same!

Paragraph 8
EE openly admit that they changed the T&Cs applicable to my account effective 26th March 2014. This clearly supports my claim that as the change in T&Cs occurred AFTER Ofcom clarified the definition of Material Detriment from 23rd January 2014 then the new price rise term must be subject to that clarification. I note that EE have declined to dispute (or even address) this point.

Paragraph 9
This –again – is factually incorrect. Whilst it is the fact that EE took the decision to change its T&Cs after 23rd January that has made one of the arguments of this claim possible, the actual dispute arises from EE not abiding by GC 9.6 and granting a penalty free cancellation when they notified me of a price increase rise in April 2014, which consider to be of Material Detriment to me under GC 9.6.

Paragraphs 14 to 31.6
These seem largely irrelevant to the claim I have made.

Paragraph 31.7
EE have provided the evidence that supports my claim - that an increase of RPI is indeed considerably higher than CPI (although the only relevant RPI/CPI comparison are the February 2014 rates which are CPI 1.7% and RPI 2.7% which is 58.8% higher than CPI ((2.7-1.7)=1/1.7=58.8%)). I note that EE do not contest that the difference between CPI and RPI is a REAL TERMS increase, and therefore even under the old Ofcom definition of Material detriment (not to my benefit or not neutral) the increase is of Material Detriment under the Ofcom definition (a REAL TERMS increase cannot be neutral).

Paragraphs 32-34.4
As per my CISAS claim:

“Should EE plead that this is a complex matter then I request that the adjudicator considers if this would warrant an additional compensation payment as EE would either:

• Not be acting in Good Faith by claiming that the matter is complex – when it is not OR
• If it considered too complex then EE have not applied the required duty of care when drafting the contract and its revisions.”
  EE are clearly pleading that this matter is complex.
  
  
  

Paragraph 34.3
EE appear to be indicating that as Material Detriment is not “defined explicitly in the Agreement” that this makes the matter complicated; on the contrary this makes things very simple - in such circumstance where a standard form contract has been drawn up then under the UTCCRs the definition most favourable to the consumer should be used, EE cannot rely on their bad drafting of the contract to defend their position and I request that as EE have admitted ambiguity then the adjudicator should find that the interpretation most favourable to me should be implied which (according to Ofcom) is that ANY price rise in core subscription prices is likely to be of material detriment.

Paragraph 36
This is further evidence of EEs lack of duty of care to me. My dislike of EEs response has nothing to do with the fact they did not contain what I wanted to hear, my displeasure stems from the fact that they have refused to respond fully to the points I have raised even when my emails clearly stated that a response that did not address the points raised would not be considered an acceptable response. Further my claim for compensation is clearly articulated in my claim. I also note that EE refer to a sum of £100, and whilst this may be higher than my original request given the response received from EE to my claim I request that the adjudicator considers if this is a more suitable sum.

delboy9

Thank you very much for your time with the quick reply. I will do exactly as you have said with the help of your template. I will report back as soon as they reply..........
:beer:

Savedotmoney

Hello everyone, My name is Carl I am the website administrator behind fightmobileincreases.com so if you have any queries about the website/templates then please PM me or reply to this thread quoting me.

I have some big news...

I have just cancelled my contract penalty free on the phone

I will be writing here later EXACTLY what I said... I have already submitted my claim to CISAS and was in the process of waiting for a reply. I NO LONGER need to do this. If you don't have success on the phone then continue as per normal but I'll explain exactly what I said later on. Cancelled in a 10 minute conversation.

YESS!!! :rotfl::T:T

Mikmonken

Savedotmoney wrote: »

Hello everyone, My name is Carl I am the website administrator behind fightmobileincreases.com so if you have any queries about the website/templates then please PM me or reply to this thread quoting me.

I have some big news...

I have just cancelled my contract penalty free on the phone

I will be writing here later EXACTLY what I said... I have already submitted my claim to CISAS and was in the process of waiting for a reply. I NO LONGER need to do this. If you don't have success on the phone then continue as per normal but I'll explain exactly what I said later on. Cancelled in a 10 minute conversation.

YESS!!! :rotfl::T:T

Looking forward to hearing how you do this, my calls to EE usually end up with me getting suckered into buying something else from them, would appreciate some pointers!!