I Forgot To Cancel My Old Mobile Phone Contract

NukaQuantum

The short story is that I was with iD mobile for a 12 month contract in 2022 which rolled on for a couple of months before I got a new SIM contract with iD mobile and struggled to get my number changed over with a PAC so I just opted to change my number. This occurred in 2023.

I have been on that new number for over 12 months as it also a rolling contract. I have discovered two direct debits have been happening from iD mobile both for £10 a month. I have spoken to their LiveChat today and they can tell that there has been absolutely no usage on the old mobile number for over a year and have cancelled it (confirmed in 30 days time).

Do I have any rights under the Direct Debit Guarantee, is it worth complaining about? Would the Ombudsman be worth contacting? I have never been in this situation before and I feel pathetically stupid.

born_again

No rights under DD guarantee.

Sadly unless ID will refund you will have to take the hit, as a learning curve to keep a eye on your bank account. 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

The Guarantee

• The Guarantee is offered by all banks and building societies that accept instructions to pay Direct Debits

• If there are any changes to the amount, date or frequency of your Direct Debit the organisation will notify you (normally 10 working days) in advance of your account being debited or as otherwise agreed. If you request the organisation to collect a payment, confirmation of the amount and date will be given to you at the time of the request

• If an error is made in the payment of your Direct Debit, by the organisation or your bank or building society, you are entitled to a full and immediate refund of the amount paid from your bank or building society

• • If you receive a refund you are not entitled to, you must pay it back when the organisation asks you to

• You can cancel a Direct Debit at any time by simply contacting your bank or building society. Written confirmation may be required. Please also notify the organisation.

Ditzy_Mitzy

I'd suspect this is Bob Hope and No Hope territory, but happy to be corrected.

From what you've said, it appears that you have, albeit inadvertently, been running two SIM-only contracts simultaneously with two different numbers.  There's nothing to stop you doing that legally and, indeed, no particular reason why iD Mobile should have prevented you from doing so - one can own and operate any number of mobile telephones.  I can't see either the Direct Debit Guarantee Scheme being interested, as a result.  There is a Communications Ombudsman, but if they're anything like the Financial Ombudsman Service they won't take unsolicited complaints - you'll have to complain to iD first and exhaust their procedures.  

The only sensible course of action would be to look at whether there was an administrative error at the point the second contract was incepted.  Did the company issue any sort of written confirmation that the first contract would be shut off?  If they did, you may have grounds to complain but if not then there's not much doing...  

saajan_12

The question is really whether you had (properly) cancelled the first sim. 

Porting via a PAC code is one way to do that - when you request it from the original and provide it to the new provider, then that does two things: ports the number and cancels the old line. However you say that did not work.

At the point that you decided to continue with the new number, what actions did you take to cancel the old line? 

[As an aside, I suspect it didn't work if you were transferring within the same provider.. it usually needs to be a different provider]

 

savergrant

A pac is a system for allowing you to transfer a number issued by one network and use it on a different network. As an aside it is a way of automatically cancelling your contract with your old provider. You cannot pac and stay with the same provider, so you would have had to;
Move to another network and then rejoin

Ask them to change your existing agreement to the new deal

Or give notice of cancelling your existing contract and start again with a new number.

So if you obtained a pac and attempted to pac within the same network what happened then? You may have some evidence that you requested them to stop providing the original service....