Vodafone - terrible customer service

MoneySaver29

Hi Guys,

I have been using this forum for a long time but never posted anything so bear with me as this may turn into a bit of a rant.

I have been with Vodafone in one of their phone contracts for almost two years and I have to say I have never had so many issues with any utilities' or phone companies ever.

A couple of months ago I subscribed to their Vodafone 'Family and Friends' package where you are able to add other numbers on Voda to get unlimited calls. I added my wife's number and the minutes were still being used from my monthly allowance. To cut a long story short, it took me several calls and dealings with inept customer service advisers before they offered £10 credit for my troubles. However, this did not fix the problem and in the end I gave up and just cut my losses.

This morning, I woke up to find that £31 of unbilled charges have been put on my account for using minutes outside of my monthly allowance, although I still have 600 minutes left? I called the customer service because I am delusional like that and felt they might be help me. But they cannot access the itemised billing part of my account to reverse any charges even though their systems clearly show I have minutes left to use. I have not called any premium numbers as I have been calling my landline number and mobile numbers I have been calling for years.

It astonishes me that the billing department of Vodafone cannot access their customers' itemised bills before the bills are generated.

So essentially, I am stuck with extra charges and not able to use my phone until the new bill is generated next week because if I do use any minutes, I risk getting charged against which is being charged around £0.45 for over a minute of call to my landline.

Sorry about such a long post - I will deal with this the best I can but what I do know is that I am NEVER going back to Vodafone once this bleeping contract finishes in July. This is just to warn others of what you may have to put up with if you are with Vodafone and just my way of ensuring others aren't out of pocket.

Thank you for reading.

whynotgoforit

Just wanted to empathise as I have recently had a similar problem. Vodafone phoned me to try to offer some better deal and came up with putting the 2nd phone (my husband's but already in my name but bought years ago via Carphone Warehouse)onto my contract and therefore gaining the "Friends and Family Package" discount. My husband's phone is SIM only but we were happy to reduce the bill from £12 monthly to £8 monthly or thereabouts. The representative then had to do a credit check on me and then send out a new SIM card, but we would be able to port the number over. He told me I could do this online. One 45 minute phone call. That was on 19 February.

The SIM card arrived but didn't work. I contacted Vodafone and they said they had no record of that number, so they would send out another SIM card. It arrived on 27 February with a bill for £2.50. I duly swapped the no over online and thought that was it. How wrong can you be.

I then began to be billed £8 a month for a telephone number I did not have. I phoned Vodafone again on 25 March. One very long phone call of 1 hour, telling my story to 4 different people, going through security a number of times, and they promised to rectify the situation. It took them a while to grasp what had happened, I don't know why. I asked if my husband should now cancel his direct debit and they said he could do so immediately. They also agreed to waive 3 months' rental charges as a result of the trouble we had had.

Then I get notification of April's invoice again with £8 for the telephone number I don't have. Worse, my husband then gets texts to say he needs to contact Vodafone urgently as his direct debit has failed. One VERY long phone call of 90 minutes on 1st April, including 1 cut off at the point of talking to the cancellations department and they promise to rectify it.

Now the 3rd April and the £8 for the rogue number has been taken on direct debit again. However the rogue number has finally disappeared from online billing. I just have to chase up a £16 refund I am owed. Just wondering if I can face the hassle.......

Thank you too for reading.

MoneySaver29

This sounds all too familiar, I didn't want to go into a lot of detail but this is exactly what happened to me. I had to call them repeatedly to explain the situation until I had no option but to just give up.

Needless to say, I am counting days until I can downgrade my contract to the cheapest tariff until the contract finishes in July and never ever go back to them.

When I joined Vodafone, I was delusional to think they would provide good customer service with being the most expensive out of the lot and one of the largest mobile networks in the country. This may sound like an unhappy customer ranting but please, please avoid Vodafone at all costs. I am tempted to report Vodafone to Ofcom but do I want the hassle?

Vodafone

Hi MoneySaver29 and whynotgoforit,

If you'd like any help from me, email me with your details via the link in our profile here.

All you need to do is copy and paste the link into your web browser and it'll take you to the Contact us form on our website. To make sure it reaches me, quote the code WRT135 - MSE in the subject line.

Once sent, you'll receive an automated reply with a reference number. Post back with this and I’ll check I've received it.

Kind regards,

Lee

Social Media Comms

Vodafone UK

whynotgoforit

Thank you Lee, I have sent a reply to you. Much appreciated...

MoneySaver29

Hi,

Email sent.

Thanks

Vodafone

Hi MoneySaver29 and whynotgoforit,

I've got your emails and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

Kind regards,

Lee

Social Media Comms

Vodafone UK

extremely_scatty

Lee - I just sent you an email via your link - I hope that was alright

Liz

Vodafone

Hi Liz,

I've got your email and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

Kind regards,

Lee

Social Media Comms

Vodafone UK

whynotgoforit

Thank you Lee, you did indeed phone me and were calm, reassuring and on the ball, unlike the Vodafone customer support staff I dealt with, who had only seemed to make matters worse. And there was no awful background noise or minutes on hold spent listening to "I'm a man, I'm a man" !!!Thank you Lee.

Alex_NJ

Are they really this bad?

I just signed a renewal with EE because of what I heard about Vodafone on this forum.

I could have actually got a much better deal with Vodafone but opted to stick with EE because of the alleged terrible customer service!