Vodafone cuts service, then unleashes debt collectors | Pricewatch reader queries

Reader Noel Browne contacted us about Vodafone, a company both he and his wife decided to leave last year because the couple, a single-income family, could no longer afford monthly bills of €65 each. "I changed my provider first and stopped the direct debit, and later paid the one-month out-of-contract penalty," he writes.

Browne also stopped his wife’s direct debit, “but she had problems with her phone and its new SIM. While we were trying to get this problem sorted, Vodafone cut off her service and she was without any service for about three months.” She eventually signed with 3 Mobile.

Browne then paid the one- month out-of-contract fee to Vodafone, which then sought a fee for the three months she had been disconnected.

“I contacted ComReg and they advised to make a complaint to Vodafone. I spoke to Vodafone and explained I did not owe this money as the phone had been disconnected.”

He was then told by Vodafone that the company had the right to charge a customer three months’ fees even if Vodafone decided to cut the service.

“I expressed my disbelief, and she said it was in the T&Cs. I then read the T&Cs and could not find any reference to this. Later, when I tried phoning Vodafone, my calls were never answered. That was in December 2014.”

In June, Browne began receiving phone calls from debt collectors demanding payment and threatening him with court. “I made a complaint to ComReg and was told to write a letter of complaint to Vodafone, which I did by registered post but received no reply. I contacted ComReg again, which then contacted Vodafone, and I received a call from someone who said she would not discuss the case because it was my wife’s phone bill and said I should go back to ComReg and re-register the complaint, which I did.”

Is your head hurting? Ours is.

ComReg then advised our reader to get his wife to ring Vodafone and tell them that Noel Browne “would be dealing with all matters relating to this”. She did this, only to be told by the Vodafone operator that he could not discuss the case because it was handed over to the debt collectors.

“I have found Vodafone unwilling to engage with me at any time,” Browne concludes, “and they are trying to intimidate me into paying.”

We contacted Vodafone, which said it had made contact with our reader and the issue was now resolved to his – and his wife’s – satisfaction.

A spokeswoman also said it was important for “customers to contact us when they want to close their account. Cancelling a direct debit indicates that a customer is changing their payment method but is not an indication that the customer wants us to cease service.”

Paying a company that doesn’t exist

In May, Dublin reader Michael O'Doherty found that he had been paying an annual direct debit of €60 to a company called RTÉ Relays – since 1984. The company no longer exists, and for years the once-a-year standing order has been going to a UPC account in Ballsbridge.

O’Doherty contacted UPC by registered post on May 12th and asked for help to resolve this problem.

“After three months and no reply I have just sent another letter,” he wrote last week. “As RTÉ Relays is no longer in operation, I find it all a bit odd that I have been paying in error for a service I did not get from a company that no longer exists.”

The reason O’Doherty contacted us was to see if any other readers were in the same situation. We would be interested in that as well, but we were also interested in what UPC had to say.

The company clarified what was going on. “All customers were sent a letter when RTÉ Relays changed its name to Cablelink in 1985 requesting them to stop their standing order with their bank and to set up a direct debit,” a spokesman said.

Our reader did not do this, so the standing order continued. After he wrote to UPC, the company made several attempts to contact him. They were unsuccessful, but had they made contact they would have said, “These payments by standing order have been and are being applied in credit to his UPC account for services provided”.

The annual standing order payment received is deducted off the balance of his account with UPC each time it is received.

“UPC has no power to cancel a standing order, as only the customer himself can issue instructions to his bank relating to his personal bank account. There are less than 20 customers in total who still part-pay some element of their account through annual standing orders originating with RTÉ Relays.”