Mobile Phone Contract not as advertised

MarkAtkins67

Hi, I took out a phone contract at Phones 4 U for a phone on o2 with 200 Mins, Unlimited texts and 500MB of Data in December 2012. My partner has been using it and I thought with 500MB of data and just browsing FB and using apps she'd never go over the usage. She uses about 150-200MB of data month.

However, I've never really checked the o2 account to see what my partner got and around September 2013 I realised she wasn't getting the 500MB of data that the contract agreement says came with the phone. I rang o2 who said there's nothing they can do as it's a contract and I'd need to fulfill it before changing to the one with 500MB of data. They did offer me a 500MB data bundle but my package price would go up by £6

I have all the paperwork from P4U that says what was supposed to come with the tariff, but P4U say that they can't do anything as it needs to be sorted by o2. I've been sending E-Mails back and fourth for a while but it seems to be getting nowhere.

I've not had this 500MB of data since I started the contract over a year ago so should I be entitled to some sort of refund or should I be able to leave the contract without penalty since they have broken their side of it by not providing me with what I pay for and signed for in the contract terms?

Thanks

mobilejunkie

Assuming the contract paperwork is from Phones4u and states the allowances as you've written, you can sue THEM for breach of contract, demanding payment of the excess charges etc.

I would have expected them to concede after receiving an appropriate and clear/firm Letter Before Legal Proceedings before you'd need to issue, but if you can prove the breach you should win in the Small Claims Court. The only "issue" is why it took you so long to notice, but I doubt that would prevent a successful action if presented well should it be necessary to go that far and the allowances actually given would have been on the monthly bills - so why didn't she check/notice?. The fact that someone else was using the phone may help explain the "why" issues.

grumbler

MarkAtkins67 wrote: »

...I have all the paperwork from P4U that says what was supposed to come with the tariff, but P4U say that they can't do anything as it needs to be sorted by o2.

They are blatantly fobbing you off. Don't let them doing this.
They sold you the contract and they have to sort everything out, including all extra charges if there were any.

You can't get out of the contract, but you can sue p4u if they keep giving you runaround. It's not that difficult.

Bingolingo

I don't think P4U sells O2 anymore so the OP may have better luck taking action directly against O2.

With O2 being the principal to the contract they are bound by the terms their agent puts in place (within reason but, this is within reason). Let them take action against p4u.

SteveHenshaw

Bingolingo wrote: »

I don't think P4U sells O2 anymore so the OP may have better luck taking action directly against O2.

With O2 being the principal to the contract they are bound by the terms their agent puts in place (within reason but, this is within reason). Let them take action against p4u.

Yup O2 are exlusive with carphone warehouse now.

SteveHenshaw

They will keep giving you the run around. Get Ofcom involved or threaten to at least. You need to bypass the general customer service reps and escalate it.