Three Mobile - incompetent, if not shady returns procedures

snedger

Hello
I've been trying to deny this stressful issue.
I do have some of the chat transcripts.
The letter they sent me telling me that they wouldn't take my money if I'd returned the phone AFTER they had already taken my money is enough to show some of the truth.
They took my £500+ because they went back on a deal or are incompetent.
I wanted to leave a contract early - they said that they wanted to charge me for the rest of my contract and I said that in return I wanted substantial compensation for a phone service that didn't work as contantly prmoised - that is the standard phone, not the mythical 5G.
Three agreed to waive the termination charges and I just had to return the phone - they sent me a returns package.
It looks like someone hadn't fed their system properly, or they're hoping that I will go away and they keep my money.
Got a statement from Three today - which is odd as my account has been closed since November 2020.
I have a credit for the amount Three took without my permission plus about £11.
Checked my online banking, nothing paid in - it could be on its way, but tomorrow is a day off and I guess I can spend it talking to the Three billing team - I predict that they will tell that the money will be in my account within 48 hours, as they have told me before.

snedger

My prediction was wrong.
I was told payment will be with be within 5 working days - BUT GET THIS - "100% guaranteed".
They took my money before following up that they thought that I hadn't returned the phone.
When they admitted that they had received the phone, they made no attempt to contact me or refund the money that they took without my permission.
In a credit statement they sent me, there was no communication that said that I could call for a refund - they needed me to call them to give them my bank details - the same bank details that they have an active direct debit to - I didn't cancel the DD 'cos I was concerned about having my credit score affected if they tried to wrongly take money with it cancelled.
So, 19th Feb - I might have a bundle of dosh again, that I used to already have.
The drinks aren't on me - 'cos the pubs are shut.
I will post what happens.
**edit forgot to say that the Three billing team operator asked if he could transfer me to their sales team for some special offers.
I didn't want to, but mindful, that if I didn't pretend to be interested, my refund might malfunction, I agreed.
I got put through to the loyalty sales team.
Explained that I was not a customer and twice explained that Three reception does not work well where I live - was still told that a new phone would a perfect Valentines gift for the lady in my life - not even going to go there on the assumptions behind that outdated nonsense.
Now watching scammer busting youtubes for pretend revenge.

epm-84

Phones4Chris said:

pmduk said:

Never call a mobile network repeatedly over the same issue. Try just once, then go down the formal complaint route.

Don't agree, sometimes persistence pays off. On a PAYG account I ended up with £15 free credit

Some mobile operators seem to think it's cheaper to have customer service advisors in India who can't resolve most of your problems but can offer compensation if you complain about a poor service.

Strangely, with 3 I found that when they have planned service outages for upgrades, that they warn you about they are able to offer up to one free month as compensation.  However, for the unplanned national outage which happened a couple of years back they were only allowed to offer up to 1/3rd of the normal monthly charge as compensation.  On that occasion I didn't complain about the national data outage but complained about how they handled it - BBC News reported it before it was on their own website and SMS messages didn't seem to be affected so they could have sent an update to all customers informing them of what's happened and updating them on when it is likely to be resolved.  However, the man in India was't interested in my feedback and wasn't willing to pass it on and kept insisting he can offer £5 compensation and no more.  I wasn't asking for more compensation!

snedger

I couldn't bring myself to check my bank transactions last week.
Checked just now and money went in on 18th Feb!
Direct Debit now cancelled.
I'm free of Three and the drinks are on ..... oh forgot, pubs still shut - soz!