Help With Orange

butterflylady

Hi,

I'm new to this posting thing, so I hope I have put this in the correct place.

I have been reading the site for a while and have been trying to sort out some extra money to clear the credit cards a little quicker. This week I have managed to pay £300 :j off mine :T . I'm very proud of this.

Thats irrelevant to the problem at hand but I'm really proud of myself.

The problem is that I have a contract mobile with Orange, costs about £20-£25 a month which is fine. get loads of free mins etc.

I rang them today to discuss adding my partners phone to the same contract as he spends £15 a month on PAYG, so it seemed logical to put them both together.

There is no way to reduce the amount as I need mine for work contacting the office and my OH needs his for work protection!!

Anyway I've gone off the point again, when I contacted them today they said I was on an 18 month contract . When I changed contracts and upgrade last year I was never told this, I would never have agreed as I had a baby in the summer and its only recently been decided that I would go back to work!!

So I spoke to a manager who just kept saying that they system showed it was an 18 month contract and that was that :mad: . When I explained she implied that I was lying!!! :mad:

I have asked for a copy of the call where they claim I was told it was 18 months, I wasn't told!!! However they say they only keep them for 6 months.

The only way out is to pay a termination fee, they will kindly reduce this to £100 for me!!! A £100 for nothing!!!!

Until today I had no intention of changing but now I just want away as fast as I can, there current date is September 2008!!!

Please help and tell me what I can do next :rotfl:

bobbadog

I have no real advice, as such, but I suggest you ring back and try and speak to someone else. Orange billed me for £38 a couple of months ago (and I never go over my £25 a month tariff) - when I rang to ask what was going on they'd accidentally put me on the wrong tariff (Dolphin Text not talk) - they firstly insinuated it was my fault for asking for the wrong thing.... anyway, when I phoned back, slightly less anoyed and spoke to someone else he sorted it all out, popped me on the right tariff and added £60 of credit to my account Try again! x

reehsetin

how did you upgrade? have you got any paperwork from when you upgraded?

butterflylady

I upgraded over the phone. They wouldn't let me go on to a cheaper tariff unless I had a 'free' phone.

I had no paper work in regards to the upgrade, I just got the new phone in the post and then the next month my bills changed.

reehsetin

whats it say on your bill? usually it says e.g. dolphin 18m plan

custardy

orange default to 18 months on upgrades in my experience.
i have 2 contracts and last time i was close to disconnecting before they relented and renewed on 12 month contracts.
they dont explicitly say this on the calls though.
if you organise an upgrade they will tell you all the minutes and stuff but unless you ask they dont mention the 18 months!

beemuzed

I've had trouble leaving Orange recently - having been with them for probably nearly 10 years.
Rang early September to cancel account, was told September 28th would be last payment(!), so I cancelled the direct debit on 1st October. Then get a letter (in mid-September ) offering free reconnection to pay as you go as I'd been a valued customer. I didn't so (BIG mistake!) shredded letter. half way through October, very stiff letter requesting instant £30 payment. Phoned and was told I'd been wrongly advised and needed to pay up. Got very angry and said I'd not be paying. Last week received credit note??? which said I now needed to pay £8.31, so, rightly or wrongly, have paid this with letter stating this is in full and final settlement, etc.
A word of advice - if you merge accounts they will only ever communicate with account holder no.1. We had huge problems with this as I was no.1 and found ringing up much more difficult than DH (semi-retired, plenty of time to hang on a phone line). Every time he was told they couldn't deal with him, it had to be me. Glad I've now (hopefully) finished with them for good.

squirrel_pigeon

A few members of my family work for Orange. The new tariffs (Dolphin, Canary etc) all default to 18 months. It'll have been in the teeny weeny small print on the stuff they sent you with your phone