Richard Askew

Anyone else tried to cancel their o2 online mobile phone contract only to be told the systems are down and they cant do anything?

Been trying all week - me thinks they're taking the pi55

what can i do?

Stueyb

It took me several months and 1 bailiffs letter and about £60 in phone calls to cancel mine. I hope you have better luck

Richard Askew

Oh ****

DJ140

Send a recorded delivery letter cancelling the contract, then cancel your direct debit?

That's what I'd do anyway.

Dan

Richard Askew

Wouldn't that leave me in breach of contract? As I havent informed them "properly"

OllyK

Check the T&C's, I suspect it says you have to give 1 months notice once the initial 12 months are up, or something similar.

Send the recorded letter, get confirmation of the signature. Wait one month and cancel.

Once you have the confirmation of receipt, I'd be tempted to write to them again and inform them of your intent.

Richard Askew

So is this something o2 do regularly to people?

Richard Askew

ps cheers Olly and Dan

OllyK

NP - dunno if O2 could or would follow up with the suggested advice, or even if it is legal, but that's what I would do and handle it from there. I would also keep a record of you phone attempts etc so you can show you have made reasonable efforts to cancel before resorting to this. A letter to OffTel (or whoever) may not go a miss either!!

Richard Askew

Is it Oftel that governs mobile companies or someone else?

Stueyb

I basically had a very torrid time, they wouldnt stop sending me phones, every time I complained they send me another phone (half of em didnt even work) I tried to take em to the o2 shop but they wouldnt take em because o2 and o2 online are different companies

I phoned the helpline at 50p a minute and got totally f*cked round and i said enough is enough, collect your stinking phones and do one. Cancelled my DD and wrote the letter. No matter who I spoke to I got passed round, and even though I had sent several dozen emails, trying to sort it out with em, they said they had passed it to an external agency. I went balistic at this point

Basically I just kept all my email and wrote them a VERY snotty registered letter, to which I never recieved a reply.

I did mention

a) Harrismant of debtors contary to the criminal justice act.
b) The way in which my information may be used for information other than that set out in the DPA, hence possible criminal proceedings.

I rang up, and told them to ring me back and sort it out NOW or they would here from MY solicitors regarding there less than adequte performance and part a pointed out before.

They did and fair enough it got sorted out by the scottish bloke on the phone, although I never got my deposit back !

*******, all of them. Id rather not have a phone rather than have an o2 one.

No keyboard was harmed in the writing of this email....barely

super_si

I cancelled mine over the phone last monday, Didnt have an problems. I need to cancel another in a weeks time aswell

S

windyboy

I tried to cancel my 02 contract a while ago but after going through the usual press 1 for... press 2 for... press... I was on hold for about 10 minutes without even speaking to a real person, so I hung up and haven't tried since. It's still in my list of things to do.
Windyboy.

Richard Askew

Was that from o2 online Si?

stevencotton

Hmm not just me then

I haven't tried to cancel but I have tried to complain to them. I'm not paying 50p a minute to talk to the people that provide me with a telephone service! Their website is a joke, I had a postage-stamp sized form to fill my complaint in. That wasn't good enough for me so I followed the links around to ... the same place. Circular help links in order that they don't need to talk to their scummy customers no doubt, and rake in the 50p per minute cash.

I sent a mail but a swear word must have crept in there about eight times or so (who's counting) so it was blocked by their nanny filter. They obviously get a lot of swearing directed at them, wonder why?.

O2 customer service is an absolute joke plain and simple. They should change the customer service page to read "I couldn't give a fsck about you or your scummy account" and at least make their intentions clear.

super_si

No i unfortunatly just read that bit sorry, it was Normal O2. But i do know its a months notice you need to give that. If youve done that then id just cancell the DD at the bank

Si

jameswrx

iTrader: (4)

I also had a nightmare with o2...

Cancelled in November last year, they kept taking my DD, I rang and told them I cancelled, they denied it, I cancelled my DD, then they sent me a letter wanting the money, rang denied I'd rang and cancelled again, sent a letter this time. Finally sorted and got a refund in April of this year after 'loosing it' many times which involved the loss of my home phone and nearly my TV.

My advice is speak to a bloke, may sound strange but all the women at call centres I talk to seem to act over agressive, plus their nasal northern drone will make you launch the phone at the tv like me

Abdabz

I think that providers of any service are "as bad as each other". I used to work for one of the Big 4 mobile companies and have friends who work for 2 rivals. There are as many examples of good and bad from each of us.
I know O2 recently upgraded its phone systems so windyboy should not have as many problems. Si - if its normal O2 and not O2 Online you do not pay 50p a minute to speak to advisors, calls are charged at national rate - thought that was less than 50p?
Raskew - Its offcom now buddy.

All mobile phone network providers are targets on ARPU and Churn. Their game is to increase ARPU (average/annual revenue per user) and decrease churn (wingin gits who chop and change providers). So O2 like any other provider has to do its upmost to try to keep you and to make you spend more. No company practises a method of ignoring / deterring contacts in a bid to lower churn...

The problem with call centres in any industry (if your lucky enough to speak to an advisor in this country) is that they are usually 18-25 yrs old, on 14k a year and couldnt give a hoopydoodah of you stay, go, eat bananas on a Tuesday. They want a nice trouble free day and out the foor bang on time, so its luck of the drawer that you get a good advisor experience... I had it recently with United Utilities - 6 contacts and a threat of court action before someone supplied me with the right info...
Shocking

P

Iwan

I cancelled mine over the phone on grounds of utterly $hite customer service. I was only 8 months into my contract so i told them i wanted to be disconnected and fo rthem to bill me for the remaining 4 months airtime and a few calls outstanding. They were fine about this, disconnected me immediately and promised to send me a bill as they couldn't take payment over the phone by card.

The bill didn't arrive. I didn't phone up to ask again as it's a 50p/min number for customer services.

After 6 months had gone by and i'd forgotten about it, i got a letter in the post from the bailiffs threatening non-payment of bills. I phoned the bailiffs immediately and paid them over the phone by debit card (as i wanted to do with O2).

IMHO, O2 are a bunch of useless to$$ers who couldn't organise a pi$$ up in a brewery.

Weird thing was, the threatening letter arrived the same days as a NIP for speeding on the M4.

Iwan

ScoobywagonGl

good luck ricjard your gonna need it! i tried to cancel mine! they wouldnt do it and so i wrote to them and cancelled my DD still paying for it now!

mik

So long as you are beyond your 12 months, phone and ask that they provide a pak(?) code. (for number porting to another provider).

They'll do this within a few days and you carry your no. to Vodafone or whatever. Works for any network porting request.

It's illegal for you to be charged for the same service from 2 providers simultaneously, so they have to cancel your contract on the date of transfer and they can't therefore hold you to 1 months notice.

Just swapped my wife from Voda to 02 in approx 12 days using this.

fast bloke

easy answer - call them up and tell them you have changed bank accounts and you need them to send you a new direct debit mandate - they will ask for your details on the phone - tell them you prefer to do it on paper - two days later they send you a direct debit mandate - put your bank details on there and give them one month notice in writing on the direct debit mandate. Cancel your existing DD

The only way they can set up the new DD is to admit having recieved the new DDM -(with appropriate notice) If they try and take more than one month payment you can take ot to Oftel and FSA (for direct debit abuse)

Scoobychick

iTrader: (1)

I cancelled my 02 contract last year (was over 12 months period), they were really not keen for me to cancel and, when they realised they couldn't better the new deal I had got with Orange suggested that I keep my O2 phone on payg which I agreed to. It cost £5 I think and the pay monthly contract was cancelled on the date I asked them to do it which was the date my new Orange contract started. O2 then sent me the new payg sim and everything was fine until I tried to register it, I lost count of how long I was kept hanging on the phone in a queue system, some days later I eventually got through and registered and have never used the payg phone since

Richard Askew

I *think* I've had some success

Spoke to the lovely Kelly at the call centre about 10 mins ago <schhhwiiiing> LOL, first thing I asked her was if the computer system was working OK, she confirmed it was...great I said - I'd like to cancel my contract - OK no problem, would you like a Pay and Go Sim card - Yup if its free I replied So she's cancelled my contract and ported my number of to the new SIM if it turns up

Cos I'm staying with o2 I dont have to give any notice

I'll cancel the DD later today

Brendan Hughes

Not O2, but I seem to be having similar trouble cancelling my old cable TV subscription here in Portugal - again, the company is a spin-off from the old national telecom company. Five phone calls and two faxes (at the end of which I was "credited" all the money I hadn't paid - and then next month it started again ) and last month I got my first solicitor's letter.

I think I'll go into their head office wearing a sandwich board in 200-pt font that says "WHAT PART OF "CANCEL MY CONTRACT" DO YOU ******* MONKEYS NOT UNDERSTAND?". Keep reading the newspapers guys...

Party Bird

When i wanted to cancel mine, i just rang them up and I verbally gave them my one month cancellation notice. They said that was sufficient enough and my contract would be cancelled in 4 weeks. It was a pretty simple process for me, but i suppose if the systems are down (???) then they cant do this until everything is up and running again i suppose. So maybe a letter of cancellation would be better....

Richard Askew

Brendan- go all Michael Douglas in "Falling Down" at them

Spoon

Do people forget it's their money ffs??

If you have tried by phone and their computers are down, then you simply cancel your direct debit from the point you no longer want to pay.

They will soon contact you believe me and if you owe anything due to your agreed contract then pay it.

Try ringing the complaints department of a business and then try ringing the sales department of the same business. I wonder who will answer the phone first, not.

Reverse that scenario at all times, let them chase you!

Always,always cancel a direct debit.

Brendan Hughes

ooh Richard - DON'T give me ideas

allywrx

The first time I phoned up to cancel, I got told to cancel my direct debit at the end of the month which I did after my bill came off.
The following month I recieved a bill, so phoned up again and they told me they had no record of me phoning. (despite them having my new address which I gave them during the same call so they could send me a free pay as you go sim card which I never recieved.)
During THIS call, the girl (Pat) told me it would be cancelled immediately, the following month, another bill
Anyway, didn't give the idiots any more money and I too got a balifs letter.
See them in court