Three. Early Termination Fee

Swannberger

My monthly contract with Three finished on 23rd of December and I decided to leave on Jan 4th. I got a PAC code. How come they charged me an early termination fee when my 2 year contract was over. The fee was £36.02. Why do they need 30 days notice and why can they fine you when you want to leave? They also didn't make me aware of this when I asked for my PAC code. Bunch of C U Next Tuesdays, in my opinion

mije1983

Swannberger wrote: »

How come they charged me an early termination fee when my 2 year contract was over.

Because you didn't give the required 30 days notice. Your contract wasn't 'over', you had simply reached the end of the minimum 2 year term, after which it went to a 30 day rolling contract.

Swannberger wrote: »

Why do they need 30 days notice

It was no doubt in the terms of the contract when you took it out. What do they say?

Swannberger wrote: »

Bunch of ....... in my opinion

I assume you have checked the terms of your new contract if you have taken one out? Do they not require 30 days notice as well? You will then be in the same situation in 18/24 months from now with your new provider.

I would say PAYG is a better bet for you, as I don't know of a contract based provider that doesn't require 30 days notice. That way you can happily leave as and when you want with no charges. It's not unique to Three.

boatman

But many companies try to get away with charging you line rental and an early termination fee for the same period and hope you don't notice.

Buzby

Because it's included in the cancellation? If you bail out of a contract not reaching the standard end date, then you pay for each month until that is reached, in this case no 30 day notice period should be added to the end.

Different firms treat notice periods differently, some want it to fall in line with your billing date cycle but as long as noticeis given 30 days before the end, the calculation will be to the end of the standard period, no additional month is added.

boatman

Buzby wrote: »

Because it's included in the cancellation? If you bail out of a contract not reaching the standard end date, then you pay for each month until that is reached, in this case no 30 day notice period should be added to the end.

If you don't reach the end of the minimum term, then yes, you should be charged an ETC.
But they'll also charge an ETC if you 'give notice' in the minimum term. This is wrong if you give 30 days notice, 30 days before the end of the minimum term and complete the contract. They should not be allowed to charge an ETC within the last 49 days like the energy contracts.

Buzby wrote: »

Different firms treat notice periods differently, some want it to fall in line with your billing date cycle but as long as notice is given 30 days before the end, the calculation will be to the end of the standard period, no additional month is added.

But if they add an ETC, and 'forget' to remove it on the final bill, you will effectively pay twice for the final month, unless of course you notice what they have done and chase it.

Buzby

In my 30 years as a mobile customer on Cellnet (and others) I have never experienced being billed an ETC when giving notice within the last 45 days. Do not confuse this with those operators who tried to milk it by not allowing notice to be given within within the minimum term, which is misleading and was outlawed by OFTEL long ago, this effectively added a further month making the contract real minimum term 13, 19 or 25 months.

If you are advocating you must check your last bill carefully, sure - but then Since I was required to pay by DD for a 'discount' I check each and every bill as I don't trust any third party to get it right without supervision.

boatman

Maybe you have been lucky, but ee certainly tried to charge with me. On another point, I called talk talk to cancel a mobile 35 days before the end of the 12 months and was told to call back at 30 days, I complained and received a deafening silence.