Originally Posted by midlands_lad:
“You'd have been required to pass a credit check before taking out a contract with Vodafone based on you having a good credit history.
Taking this into account, if you cancelled your direct debit and refuse to pay then you will have your details passed on to a debt collection agency by Vodafone. The non-payment will also feature on your future credit history, causing you problems when applying for credit or taking out a mobile phone contract in future, so it will cause you plenty of unwanted problems somewhere down the line.
Working for Vodafone I've seen this from both ends of the scale: you can be passed on to a debt collection agency due to non-payment, while potential new customers are unable to take out a contract with us because of their past credit history.”
Thanks for the info Midlands_lad.
Interestingly, accoring to a recent report "Unpaid bills and defaulting customers are costing mobile operators around $26 billion* every year with around 5% of total billings being written off annually" so clearly a few million people are getting away with non-payment.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating that people try to rip their phone company off (as some have assumed) merely trying to understand what action non-payment would trigger.
So, if anyone out there has actually tried just cancelling their DD please post here!