plusnet landline 'call credit' misleading?

triade

I feel as though I have been misled and left with a phone bill of £30 over my standard bill. it could easily be my fault, but I feel aggrieved at how this has happened.

I wanted to set up a call plan so I called them up and asked them to add it to my account. they were awfully nice about it and offered to also add a credit into my account so I could make calls until my next bill. I certainly appreciate that gesture and not trying to underplay that. I took a look into my account to see if the £20 credit had gone on and see how i could keep track and ensure I don't go over it. after double checking everywhere, all I could find was a call credit of £55. I found this confusing but I guessed either he had actually given me more, or my account came with a standard credit of £35 that I never realised before.  of course I kept track of it to make sure I didn't go past it and stopped at around £50 used. got my bill and see it is £30 more than expected. very confused, feeling a bit panicked and upset, I called them up.  they told me that the £55 'credit' is a limiter to stop me spending too much on my phone bil, and I owe them for the calls. they said the £20 'credit' i had been given was deducted from it.

I feel like this language is too confusing and I made natural assumptions that anyone else might make. I don't feel they intentionally mislead me, but I feel like this is unfair. Yes I made the calls, but I made them under the impression that this was included in my account. I naturally looked at 'credit' on my phone account and equated it with 'credit' on a payg phone balance.

I would really like it if they cancel those charges of course, but they have refused thus far. I feel like there is probably things in their policy and in my account somewhere that could easily show that I'm to blame, but this feels wrong.

Neil_Jones

The £55 thing is just the maximum cost amount of (not inclusive) calls you can make between bills.  It resets on your next date.  If you make a lot of calls  (more than about 1hr a month) it makes far more sense to have one of the call package options - all inclusive for example.

It has always been the case at Plusnet that changes you make to the account do not take effect until the next bill date, so if you add the call package on the 15th but you don't get billed until the 7th, calls you make before that date will still be chargeable at the rates listed on the website.

Unfortunately the current rate of landline calls means £20 credit doesn't actually go very far, depending on who and when you call it can vanish pretty quickly.  The calls should appear on the next bill.

triade

thanks for replying but you have essentially parroted the same thing they said over the phone five times. I don't need to 'understand how it works', i feel like you didn't even read what I wrote.

Neil_Jones said:

It has always been the case at Plusnet that changes you make to the account do not take effect until the next bill date, so if you add the call package on the 15th but you don't get billed until the 7th, calls you make before that date will still be chargeable at the rates listed on the website.

this is very nice, but I don't make a habit of tracking the operating procedures of different internet companies and generally only know what I'm told by them. I feel I was misled so I feel I might have some legal right to pressure them to cancel the charges. I want to know about that.

Neil_Jones

Well I don' know what you're were expecting to be told but if you do changes online it tells you the changes do not take effect until the next bill.  They should have told you this on the phone line.  If you're saying they didn't then go back and ask them to listen to the original call.  If it turns out they did tell you and you didn't pay heed to it, then that's not Plusnet's fault.

But it doesn't change the basic fact you've made the calls you still have to pay for them as they are technically outside of your package.  The key phrase seems to be "I guessed [(my emphasis)] either [somebody at Plusnet] had actually given me more [call credit], or my account came with a standard credit of £35 that I never realised before", so with all due respect it sounds you assumed without actually checking what was the case.

With Plusnet credits (bar the £55 thing already discussed which isn't a "credit" as such) don't actually appear anywhere as such in the online portal, they only appear on the bill when they're generated.

As for "I don't make a habit of tracking the operating procedures of different internet companies and generally only know what I'm told by them" - this is why we have web forums so if you'd asked, somebody would have told.  But you didn't, so they didn't.

triade

so I am aware that in contract law, ambiguity in a contract automatically favours the party that didn't draft it. my assertion is that the naming of that £55 as 'credit' is ambiguous, so in law, should I be able to demand that they cancel the fees?
if you're certain that in this case the ambiguity or misleading language is not protected under law, then I will just have to begrudgingly let it go.

i mean, I'm not trying to rip them off or anything. if I honestly thought for a second that the £55 was not mine to spend, then I would not have made the calls. and I went out of my way to add a call plan to my account so I am giving them more business here. I feel wronged.

edit:

two deleted posts after this one. one of them calling me dishonest and the other my reply to that.

Neil_Jones

triade said:

There's no need to be nasty. I am a very honest person, thank you very much and anyone who knows me would attest to that.  I would never dream of keeping money I found on the floor if I could figure out who dropped it. I refuse to keep incorrect change at the store. How dare you judge me?  Did you not read what I said? I thought it had been given to me. After all, I pay plus.net for a line rental that gives me phone services. I can't keep track of every little thing that is part of the package as their terms and conditions are thousands of lines of tiny writing and I happen to have a form of dyslexia. I don't come here to be belittled or judged by other forum users, I come here to try and resolve a distressing situation for me.

Plusnet normally raise tickets for these sort of things.  Which you get emailed about.  (and you can also read at https://www.plus.net/wizard/?p=search ) So if the £20 credit of which you speak was applied it should be in an email or question and it should be coming off your next bill.

If its not in the Help Assistant, then (with respect) it probably didn't happen and you may have misunderstood the call agent at the time.  I'd suggest going back to them explain the situation and ask them to review the original call.

triade said:

so I am aware that in contract law, ambiguity in a contract automatically favours the party that didn't draft it. my assertion is that the naming of that £55 as 'credit' is ambiguous

Except it isn't ambiguous because there's a separate page for it, it's documented here:

https://www.plus.net/help/phone/about-phone-credit/

RogerBareford

triade said:

There's no need to be nasty. I am a very honest person, thank you very much and anyone who knows me would attest to that.  I would never dream of keeping money I found on the floor if I could figure out who dropped it. I refuse to keep incorrect change at the store. How dare you judge me?  Did you not read what I said? I thought it had been given to me. After all, I pay plus.net for a line rental that gives me phone services. I can't keep track of every little thing that is part of the package as their terms and conditions are thousands of lines of tiny writing and I happen to have a form of dyslexia. I don't come here to be belittled or judged by other forum users, I come here to try and resolve a distressing situation for me.

They told you on the phone they were giving you £20 credit so if you thought they had given you £55 instead then it was obviosuly a mistake and it you should have questioned it before trying to spend it.

A good example is if someone gave you an envelope with cash as a gift and said "here is £20" and when you open it you find £55 instead then surely you would ask them if it was a mistake and it would be unethical to spend it.

triade

RogerBareford said:

They told you on the phone they were giving you £20 credit so if you thought they had given you £55 instead then it was obviosuly a mistake and it you should have questioned it before trying to spend it.

A good example is if someone gave you an envelope with cash as a gift and said "here is £20" and when you open it you find £55 instead then surely you would ask them if it was a mistake and it would be unethical to spend it.

 No ,  what I meant by that is, I thought either he had put more on there because he seemed really nice and seemed to be bending the rules in some ways, or I thought they had given it to me as part of my line rental.  It seems what you are saying though is that I should have double checked.  The fact that it was using the same language as payg phone contracts doesn't seems to be factoring in here although I thought that was enough ambiguity for me to be able to rest on my natural assumption.  Also, as Neil is pointing out, it is written on their website somewhere and I was plainly unaware of it.  I am aware that when it comes to legal things, ignorance of the law is not a defence, so I can apply the same principle here. Although it hurts and puts me in financial difficulty, it seems that this is a watertight case and I am a simple victim of an unfortunate set of circumstances.  I believe that they should rename it something like 'buffer',  but it seems that is neither here nor there, companies can use confusing language on their services with impunity I guess. I honestly thought consumer law protected against confusing language but I guess not.

RogerBareford

triade said:

RogerBareford said:

They told you on the phone they were giving you £20 credit so if you thought they had given you £55 instead then it was obviosuly a mistake and it you should have questioned it before trying to spend it.

A good example is if someone gave you an envelope with cash as a gift and said "here is £20" and when you open it you find £55 instead then surely you would ask them if it was a mistake and it would be unethical to spend it.

 No ,  what I meant by that is, I thought either he had put more on there because he seemed really nice and seemed to be bending the rules in some ways, or I thought they had given it to me as part of my line rental.  It seems what you are saying though is that I should have double checked.  The fact that it was using the same language as payg phone contracts doesn't seems to be factoring in here although I thought that was enough ambiguity for me to be able to rest on my natural assumption.  Also, as Neil is pointing out, it is written on their website somewhere and I was plainly unaware of it.  I am aware that when it comes to legal things, ignorance of the law is not a defence, so I can apply the same principle here. Although it hurts and puts me in financial difficulty, it seems that this is a watertight case and I am a simple victim of an unfortunate set of circumstances.  I believe that they should rename it something like 'buffer',  but it seems that is neither here nor there, companies can use confusing language on their services with impunity I guess. I honestly thought consumer law protected against confusing language but I guess not.

I think your confusing the issue here. They told you on the phone your getting £20 credit so anything else was obviously wrong or a mistake.

You decided to go onto your account see a figure of £55 and decide off your own back that is the amount they gave you but they never told you this was anything to do with it.

Just remember in the future if somesays says you will get an amount of money and you get a different amount then always check as any mistakes can be cleared up.

Neil_Jones

triade said:

RogerBareford said:

They told you on the phone they were giving you £20 credit so if you thought they had given you £55 instead then it was obviosuly a mistake and it you should have questioned it before trying to spend it.

A good example is if someone gave you an envelope with cash as a gift and said "here is £20" and when you open it you find £55 instead then surely you would ask them if it was a mistake and it would be unethical to spend it.

 No ,  what I meant by that is, I thought either he had put more on there because he seemed really nice and seemed to be bending the rules in some ways, or I thought they had given it to me as part of my line rental.  It seems what you are saying though is that I should have double checked.  The fact that it was using the same language as payg phone contracts doesn't seems to be factoring in here although I thought that was enough ambiguity for me to be able to rest on my natural assumption.  Also, as Neil is pointing out, it is written on their website somewhere and I was plainly unaware of it.  I am aware that when it comes to legal things, ignorance of the law is not a defence, so I can apply the same principle here. Although it hurts and puts me in financial difficulty, it seems that this is a watertight case and I am a simple victim of an unfortunate set of circumstances.  I believe that they should rename it something like 'buffer',  but it seems that is neither here nor there, companies can use confusing language on their services with impunity I guess. I honestly thought consumer law protected against confusing language but I guess not.

The moral of the story here is:  Never assume.  Always check.  There is no such thing as a free lunch after all, and much like emergency credit you get on energy prepayment meters that the supplier "gives" you when you can't get to the shop, that emergency credit still has to be paid back.

Have you done what I suggested, search the Help Assistant and/or ask Plusnet to go back to the original recording or not?  If you have no intention of finding out what you actually agreed to or what the Plusnet assistant said they would do for you, then you can't really complain about the situation you're in because that's the easiest way to solve it once and for all.  If the call recording reveals you agreed to it (and you were told it had to be paid back), then the case is closed so cough up the dough.  However if you were told one thing by Plusnet that you agreed to and they went and did something else... that's different.

triade

I could ask them to review it. I felt pretty confused about the services at the time so I don't really remember everything from the call, but the fact that I got confused by it, may lead to them reassessing how this has played out. After all, that phone call was made specifically to set up a call plan so I wouldn't be running up these kinds of charges.

edit:

thanks for prompting me to talk about this and investigate further. from my perspective, he told me he was putting £20 credit in my account and that screen with the £55 credit was the only reference I could find and their website is failing to load properly for me lately so that is why I struggled to find information. I remembered this when I visited just now because it's still struggling to load pages. anyway, not only did he use language that led me to the bills page where it shows £55 credit, he did not tell me he was placing a deduction on my next bill, he specifically told me he was adding credit into my account and that I would be able to use that credit to make calls. moreover, when looking for that page, the button used to access it says this :"You can also check how much credit you've used or top-up your credit.". this language is almost identical to the language used for payg phones. I wouldn't be surprised if this is intentionally misleading so I now feel confident that they should cancel those charges. I feel empowered to write to them and explain these things and request they remove the charges. if they don't I will take this case to the ombudsman. I appreciate you guys spending time to talk to me about this.