Leaving Post Office Broadband

nellielh

Hi all,
I would like to know if anyone else has had a similar experience with Post Office. I had a 12 month contract with them costing me £15 a month which ended in November 2019. The speed was horrendous and decided to leave to go with Virgin Media. I contacted Post Office in October and explained to them I would like to leave and will be going with a new provider, they said that’s fine I need to contact the new provider and they will be able to take care of the situation. I contacted Virgin Media explained the situation and they said it would be taken care of. Fast forward to now, while trying to manage my finances I notice that Post Office has been charged me £30 a month since November.
I am obviously absolutely gutted about this and neither company is saying they are liable. To add salt to the wound, Post Office has sent me a letter saying there will be one final payment due 22nd June when I called them up today to dispute it they said there’s nothing they can do. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, I really don’t know where I stand but I can’t afford this at all.

pallyman

I think when you move to Virgin you have to tell your current provider and give them 30 days notice .

Neil_Jones

Yeah what you should have done is told Post Office you were terminating the line as you were moving to Virgin.  What's probably happened is they assume you're moving to another provider on the BT Network, you never placed a request so the account carried on.

Cancel it now, and in all honesty you probably should have noticed in January the payment was still coming out, not in June six months later.

nellielh

I did contact the Post Office though to tell them I was leaving in October. That should of been enough me calling them then, instead of them fobbing me off with ‘no problem, tell your new provider and they can deal with it’. 

I know I should of noticed sooner but money management has never been my greatest skill, hence why I’m on this forum trying learn more. Where do I stand with them taking another £30 from my account? 

ColinD1

There is a general problem that things are confusing as to how things work and depend on detailed circumstances.
Perhaps each provider should provide guidance to people joining them in the order acceptance email and also each provider provide on their website "How to leave us cleanly".
The switching websites should also provide  clearer guidance on how to avoid things going wrong. 
Ofcom makes it appear easy.
As a customer it is not as clear as it is to the provider. They do not make it easy to understand and a cynic may say they make money out of the customers confusion and mistakes. Note when you switch (smoothly and successfully), you should receive a proportion of the fees you paid in advance but you probably need to discover how to claim it.
Switching is not as advanced as the process for energy.

saildreamer

I’m in a 12 month contract with the Post Office and I can’t wait to leave. They are truly the worse internet provider I have ever used! 

I hope you are compensated for the extra money you’ve paid out. I’ve take. Note of your dilemma and will be extra cautious in December when I switch companies. 

ColinD1

Just understand fully and know what you doing. Even if you do, as I did, things can still go wrong. Unfortunately the customer needs to take care and people are making incorrect assumptions. Good luck.

Neil_Jones

nellielh said:

I did contact the Post Office though to tell them I was leaving in October. That should of been enough me calling them then, instead of them fobbing me off with ‘no problem, tell your new provider and they can deal with it’. 

I know I should of noticed sooner but money management has never been my greatest skill, hence why I’m on this forum trying learn more. Where do I stand with them taking another £30 from my account? 

Telling them you're moving provider and providing notice are two entirely different things.  Normally if you move from one BT provider to another you just pick somebody, sign up with them and they do all the work.  If you're moving to Virgin this doesn't apply, in fact I believe Virgin tell you this when you sign up with them that you have to contact the old provider to terminate as they can't do it.

As to them keep taking money, phone them up and say you want to terminate the line as you are not on the BT network anymore so you have no need for it.  This will be your 30 days.  The previous payments you may want to write to them about as a complaint but be prepared to put it down to experience, and this is the greatest way you will learn about money management.   It is not the provider's fault that you are effectively paying for two internet services, that's something you should really have picked up yourself. Years ago when you were waiting for statement in the post you may be excused, but in this day and age It doesn't take more than five minutes a day to log onto Santander or Halifax or whoever and look down a list of transactions and you would have spotted it in January.