I quit my contract with this company, back on 2nd August, after three years with them. When my final month's payment was collected, on 11th August, I cancelled the Direct Debit through which my payments had been being collected. My reason for doing this was that, upon checking my terms and conditions, it was stated that each monthly payment represents a full month's rental in advance, plus any calls you've incurred during the previous month. Since I hadn't used the phone for a while and the whole amount of my bill had therefore for some time represented that 'rental in advance' amount (about £31), and I had no intention to use that number again from that time up to the contract expiring, by my calculations there should have been nothing further to pay. In fact, since there was less than one full month to go from 11th August when they took the payment until 2nd September when the contract was to be cancelled, if anything I felt I was due some of that £31 I'd paid in advance back.
Come 11th September, and these jokers again tried to take a full month's 'rental in advance' from my account (i.e., another £31), and sent me a threatening letter when they couldn't (because I'd cancelled the Direct Debit). When I called them up, I got a load of flannel, followed by an admission that it was their mistake. To add insult to injury, it wasn't even possible to get through to the number that was quoted on their threatening letter unless you had an 'active' Orange mobile number (which you had to enter at one point in the filtration process), so I actually had to guess at what might still be an active number to speak with anyone at all. Skip ahead a bit, and I got another letter, this time requesting a different (lower) amount. When I called their collections department, I got a load of flannel again, and some talk of them now having credited my account with a portion of a month that they'd tried to collect that they weren't entitled to on 11th September, leaving a smaller amount still to be paid. After getting them to check and clarify why they felt they were entitled to anything at all, they again admitted it was their mistake, and advised me to ignore the bill.
On each occasion that I spoke with Orange, with the end result that they admitted their mistake, I asked them to send a letter to close the matter, clarifying their revised position. Each time I asked for this, the response I got was that it was "not company policy" to send letters (funny that, since they don't seem to have any difficulty sending letters asking for money that they are not entitled to). To my reading, therefore, their repeated verbal admissions of their error were just a way of getting someone that was presenting uncomfortable truths off the phone, leaving them a later opportunity to take an entirely contradictory position in writing. After the second threatening letter / phonecall, therefore, I reported the matter to Ofcom, who said they had made a note of it, but were pretty toothless and useless beyond that to be honest.
Today, I received yet another letter from this bunch of con men, which, needless to say, flew in the face of everything we'd previously agreed by telephone. The bill is only for £16, but it's the principle: it is an amount that they are not entitled to.
Against my better judgement, I called their 'customer service' department to relate the above story today, then paid the amount, purely to make them go away. I told them that I would never use their service again, and would never recommend them to anyone. Their whole attitude to this was "hey, we don't care, we've got our £16". I hope they enjoy spending it; it'll be the very last they ever see from this customer. I can only advise that other consumers avoid them like the plague too.
Come 11th September, and these jokers again tried to take a full month's 'rental in advance' from my account (i.e., another £31), and sent me a threatening letter when they couldn't (because I'd cancelled the Direct Debit). When I called them up, I got a load of flannel, followed by an admission that it was their mistake. To add insult to injury, it wasn't even possible to get through to the number that was quoted on their threatening letter unless you had an 'active' Orange mobile number (which you had to enter at one point in the filtration process), so I actually had to guess at what might still be an active number to speak with anyone at all. Skip ahead a bit, and I got another letter, this time requesting a different (lower) amount. When I called their collections department, I got a load of flannel again, and some talk of them now having credited my account with a portion of a month that they'd tried to collect that they weren't entitled to on 11th September, leaving a smaller amount still to be paid. After getting them to check and clarify why they felt they were entitled to anything at all, they again admitted it was their mistake, and advised me to ignore the bill.
On each occasion that I spoke with Orange, with the end result that they admitted their mistake, I asked them to send a letter to close the matter, clarifying their revised position. Each time I asked for this, the response I got was that it was "not company policy" to send letters (funny that, since they don't seem to have any difficulty sending letters asking for money that they are not entitled to). To my reading, therefore, their repeated verbal admissions of their error were just a way of getting someone that was presenting uncomfortable truths off the phone, leaving them a later opportunity to take an entirely contradictory position in writing. After the second threatening letter / phonecall, therefore, I reported the matter to Ofcom, who said they had made a note of it, but were pretty toothless and useless beyond that to be honest.
Today, I received yet another letter from this bunch of con men, which, needless to say, flew in the face of everything we'd previously agreed by telephone. The bill is only for £16, but it's the principle: it is an amount that they are not entitled to.
Against my better judgement, I called their 'customer service' department to relate the above story today, then paid the amount, purely to make them go away. I told them that I would never use their service again, and would never recommend them to anyone. Their whole attitude to this was "hey, we don't care, we've got our £16". I hope they enjoy spending it; it'll be the very last they ever see from this customer. I can only advise that other consumers avoid them like the plague too.



