Help with challenging default through theft

Re_tommo

Hello,

I had been a pay-as-you-go customer with Vodafone since 2003 and in 2010, I opened a phone contract with the company. My usual bill was between £20 and £25 per calendar month.

On 15th June 2013, I had my phone stolen in Barcelona, Spain whilst on holiday there. I reported the theft of the handset to police (I have the police report still.)

Unfortunately, I did not report the phone as stolen to Vodafone, for two main reasons. The first was that I was without a telephone and the second was that I was unable to access my online account due to a ‘password reset infinite loop’, a technical fault with the Vodafone website which was heavily documented on online forums at the time.

I feel it’s likely that I was the victim of a criminal gang who steal handsets and use these to dial revenue-generating, premium-rate numbers 24-hours a day using conference calling facilities. There are other stories from victims online who have found themselves in similar scenarios.

When I returned home less than a week later, I visited my local Vodafone branch to purchase a new handset and was told that I was liable to pay a bill totalling £3,300.

My experience of trying to resolve this was horrendous and included; a staff member assuring me the bill had been wiped when it hadn’t; the money being withdrawn from my account when the account was in deadlock without my consent which resulted in bank charges and numerous attempts by Vodafone to contact me on a line they had suspended. This led to a complaint to the ombudsman and the involvement of my MP.

The account went to complaints, and then ‘deadlock’. On my Equifax report (full credit report) there are two payments late for September and October 2013, then from November 2013 to March 2014 there are defaults shown. The default date is shown as 1st March 2014 and the ‘satisfied’ date as 1st September 2014. On Experian (example score) it appears that the default is shown (in red) from October 2013, satisfied approx September 2014, but then the account is shown as in the red for a further 4 months after that (I’m not sure why.) So the two different credit agencies have slightly different dates for both default and settled, but both shown as settled in September 2014.

‘In 2012, Ofcom told mobile phone companies to put credit-card style caps in place and in December 2013 the Dept for Culture, Media and Sport announced it had agreed a voluntary cap on liability to come into force in spring 2014’. (From the Guardian article below.) Clearly I was amongst the last people to suffer this situation.

There are cases of people fighting such bills on the basis of ‘unjust enrichment’, given that phone companies are aware of premium-rate services being abused in this way and that Vodafone profits massively from this criminal activity. They could also be considered to have been ‘not conducting services in a reasonable manner’ by not shutting down the phone earlier. (This is based on the legal advice from Richard Colbey, who supported a gentleman with a similar problem, as quoted in the Guardian article…’Victory against Vodafone for schoolteacher billed £15,000’

Roll forward to July 2019, and I’m thinking about buying a house with my partner. We agreed to take out credit cards to start to build up a credit history, with the anticipation of going for a mortgage 6 – 12 months later. I was rejected (by my bank of ca. 12 years) on the basis of having a default on my credit report. They suggested to contact the credit rating agencies (Experian and Equifax) to ask for it to be removed, after explaining the situation above. To be clear, the detail above about my credit report, I did not know until I was rejected for a credit card – I was under the impression it had all been settled years ago. Experian told me to contact Vodafone directly to ask for it to be removed.

The first thing I did was send a “goodwill adjustment” letter to Vodafone’s quality assurance department around the end of July (this was what someone else had done successfully on a forum). I have still had no reply to this.

After that, I rang Vodafone, and was told that there was no information on their system about me ever having owned that account. They checked a previous IT system, and still nothing was found. They are also unable to make notes about my letter or calls, as they have no account to attribute it to. They suggested I went into a store, which I did. In the store, they told me to contact the complaints department by phone. Then essentially the same thing happens – can’t locate my account and nothing can be done. They then broke GDPR and asked if I was “Helen Moor”, who I assume holds the phone number now.

This leaves me in an impossible situation, clearly. I have also started to contact citizens advice, but thought I should perhaps post on here first to get a “financial experts” opinion.

So, as well as general advice about what to do, I would like to know what I should do with regard to the following.

1) How can I get Vodafone to take this seriously and listen to me, and act?
2) If I cannot do that, who do I turn to (MP, ombudsman, citizens advice, solicitor etc)?
3) Finally, should this disappear from my credit report regardless in September 2020 (which I don’t want to have to wait for, but at least I would know it is an ultimate backstop)?

I am really grateful for your time taken to read this, and any help offered. Thank you.

Willing2Learn

You say Equifax have recorded the default date as March 2014 and that Experian have recorded the default as October 2013. Defaults are automatically removed from your credit files after six years, which means you have not got long to go now. You should be able to get a sub-prime credit card without difficulty (assuming there is no other adverse data on your credit files and you are registered on the ER)

If you want to find out what information Vodafone have recorded on your account then you could submit a SAR request

xlnc99

To be honest you may have just got lucky. If voda have no record of you then tell them to remove the default from your credit file!

Get everything in writing - win win for you!

Assuming you paid the £3300 bill back in 2014 or was that outstanding? What happend with the final bill situation

[Deleted User]

This all seems a bit exuberant for a phone theft.

Why didn’t you call Vodafone at the time?
There most have been other phones you could use?

Has the debt been paid or not?

xlnc99

Clearly ......

Voda are denying he was a customer, even though he was. They are pushing him from pillar to post and he cant get through to anyone to acknowledge this at vodafone. They all claim he was never a customer and never had an account. Therefore he can call their bluff and tell them to remove all their details from his credit report?

Is that easy enough for you? Next time just ask if you need someone to go through in detail with baby steps for every point. I realise not everyone understands complicated situations. Some people need to have everything broken down step by step to fully understand statements. Next time just ask, no need to be so angry when you dont get something. I know it must be hard.

We all support you

macman

All this could have been avoided by the simple precaution of PIN-locking the phone and SIM of course.

Re_tommo

Thanks. Not much help now. I do believe it had a PIN lock actually.

boo_star

xlnc99 wrote: »

Clearly ......

Voda are denying he was a customer, even though he was. They are pushing him from pillar to post and he cant get through to anyone to acknowledge this at vodafone. They all claim he was never a customer and never had an account. Therefore he can call their bluff and tell them to remove all their details from his credit report?

Is that easy enough for you? Next time just ask if you need someone to go through in detail with baby steps for every point. I realise not everyone understands complicated situations. Some people need to have everything broken down step by step to fully understand statements. Next time just ask, no need to be so angry when you dont get something. I know it must be hard.

We all support you

Front line staff are often poorly trained and won't have access to certain systems that will likely show the OP was indeed a customer.

I suppose there's nothing to stop the OP pursuing that angle but I expect the chance of successfully getting the default removed via this route is very low.

macman

Re_tommo wrote: »

Thanks. Not much help now. I do believe it had a PIN lock actually.

No, but it might prevent others from making the same mistake in future.
PIN-locking the phone only does not protect you, as they simply remove the SIM and use it in another handset. You need to protect the SIM as well.