Invoice companies for bad service

hebawom

I'm currently working in an admin role, and a part of my job is opening mail and assessing which department I should send it to. But if a letter is addressed to a person and these golden words is on the envelope "Private and Confidential" - it will be opened by the addressee.

wigglebeena

I opened the mail in one job - Private and Confidential was the mark that the paperboy or milkman could open it if he liked. The international stamp for BS!

geordie_joe

hebawom wrote: »

I'm currently working in an admin role, and a part of my job is opening mail and assessing which department I should send it to. But if a letter is addressed to a person and these golden words is on the envelope "Private and Confidential" - it will be opened by the addressee.

Me too, but in large companies the people "really high up" then have a secretary or pa to open/screen their mail.

I read somewhere that Bill Gates has over 20 just to screen his emails. His email address is so obvious millions of people send him emails, but he is too stubborn to change it. So he employs people just to screen the emails and pick out the genuine ones which are then either left for him or passed on to another company dept.

geordie_joe

wigglebeena wrote: »

I opened the mail in one job - Private and Confidential was the mark that the paperboy or milkman could open it if he liked. The international stamp for BS!

In law it has no meaning on an envelope, but a company may have a specific rule about opening them.

On the course I was on they said the royal mail only have duty to deliver post to an address, once that is done they have nothing more to do with it and neither does the law.

However, you should be careful when opening other people's mail. If you do it with intent to commit fraud, or any other offence then you can get done for it.

bunnygirl007

I returned some clothes I ordered off the M&S website and they failed to credit the refund back to my account (long story). Anyway I eventually got it back but I also asked for the interest I had incurred as a result of still having £110 sitting on my M&S credit card over the 2 months i had been trying to resolve this. They were unable to refund the interest but they did offer me £15 gift vouchers instead, which reallly was a much better result. :j

I think you should always try to get something for the inconvenience you have been caused. They're always quick to charge us if the boot's on the other foot.

pcyam

My mum applied for the HSBC bank account and credit card via rpoints to take advantage of the cashback.

A gentleman on the phone rang to make sure we had recived everything and said we could either send in the id via post or take into a branch, as there was no envelope we took into the branch as we've never had any problems with the staff before.

As my mums english is better than basic but not great she can have a conversation , BUT I put everything together so all she had to do was hand in the documents for them to photocopy etc. and she returned home with paperwork which was given to her. When I finished work I checked to make sure everything was ok, BUT realised the branch had opened a fresh new application for both bank account and credit card. Not only did they do this, they opened the wrong bank account where there was a monthly charge (the plus account), the credit card had a lower limit,Mum said that she clearly said all she wanted to do was hand this in, and the lady took her into a room sat her down and was looking at teh computer screen and asked her 2 questions-where are u from and who did the applciation for u. Mum felt very uncomfortable and she felt she was takena dvantaged of. And she being my mum I dont like that :mad:


I spoke to the call centre and they confirmed that the application was a new one opened in the local branch, and to go in and complain. Mum wasnt too sure who it was so I took time off work and went in with her this time. BUT to my amazement we realised it was in fact the BRANCH MANAGER, which did all this. :eek:. The manager was not available, and the staff (off the record) didnt want to get involved as they said she didnt follow procedure. and made an appointment for her to ring me back in the next hour or so. BUT had to go into the branch after half a day to chase the phone call. I wanted to speak to her face to face rather than over the phone, I was only ever able to take days off on Fridays, whereas she couldnt make fridays, at this stage I was getting a little annoyed. I also commented that she made mum feel uncomfortable and she took advantaged of the fact her english wasnt great-she said there was misunderstanding, I replied you only asked mum 2 questions so how can there be misunderstanding. BUT Finally managed to make an appointment 2 weeks later and during this time she was going to 'try' and sort everything out. During this conversation not only did she admit to opening a fresh new accounts (with the additional credit scoring-without consent) she also couldnt answer to me as to why she did it, and that we wanted the scoring to be removed and also we had lost out on the reward from rpoints, and also I would apply for mums credit report to show the search had been removed. She offered a goodwill of £50.

The following week I received a phone call from the manager, with the conclusion that because my mum was an existing customer they couldnt process the bank account which we applied online for and that mum had not been credit scored. BUT the credit card was the original application. and they would still offered a £50 goodwill gesture. Well, I wanted all the original paperwork which mum took in and she said they would be ready to collect when we next met in the branch, As I'm not too sure with HSBC's process I left it as it was, and checked with the branch staff (out of hours) and luckily I work with a couple of girls whcih recently left HSBC, and all confirmed that the process was not followed.

So couple of days later I received a phone call from one of the area managers (manager was on holiday) confirming the process had been followed, and that the manager had not done anything wrong. BUT also what she was saying was contridicting what the manager was saying. She apologised as she had only had a brief discussion with the manager and will re-contact her once she came back from holiday. This stage I was annoyed-and thinking how can someone contact a customer without getting the full facts??????? She wasnt even aware of the £50 goodwill and the fact I was going to meet the manager. She was also going to send out a letter to my mum as soon as we put the phone down and that everything will be like for like to the original applications.

That same week mum had some letters, cards etc etc through, AND the credit card was completely different (incorrect limit and there was card protection on it), and NO letter from the branch/AM.

I turned up at the bank on friday, and the manager wasnt even ready for the meeting, she thought I wasnt going to meet as I've spoken to the area manager (I replied no one contacted me to confirm anything and that I had not received any letter from the AM and as I previously said that I wanted the paperwork I was here to collect those) she didnt have the paperwork to collect they were in a different branch (no reason given) she was going in and out of the office at least 3 times, and that she as going to get a copy of the letter from her AM which was sent out last week. Well I read the letter and some of the content was incorrect.

I also said that the credit card is all wrong and that nothing had been done and mum had lost out on a months worth of the 0% as she didnt know what was happening. So the manager said she would change the limit and also change the end date of the promotion to a further month. (she amended the letter and included additional comments about the credit card) I thought fine all sorted.

My had a statement through and thought nothing of it, just pay the minimum, but when she came to pay something she had been rejected (couldnt understand why) went home and realised the limit hadnt been increased. Today went into the branch and the boy said the manager has now transferred to different branch. and he would ring through to card services, (they want to do ANOHTER credit search on mum - I SAY NO and he would see if theres anythign they could do and wanted me to wait for 10 mintures, well i wanted a callback instead its been over 1hr and still nothing. and im thinking of complaining like the OP but do you think its a good ebough of a case to get anything done and some compensation for mum???


As the call was on a mobile, I recorded the conversations with the manager on both occassions and with the AM, also recorded when i went in to meet the manager too.

Apologises for the length and thanks in advanced for any comments.