So, on reading through some of the posts on here its become apparent (to me at least) that we are all getting ripped off left right and centre by companies using deceptive methods, shoddy customer service and plain ignorance. I say sod that, lets name and shame these companies and create resource for people looking to change suppliers or make a purchase. My first Name and shame would have to be Santander! 4 months running my direct debit Credit card payment failed. Each time I rang up, paid and re setup the direct debit. Each time I was promised the problem had been sorted and each time the same thing happened. Checking my credit file I noticed that there were notes from Santander claiming I had "missed" my payments. I called them for the 5th time and was told that I needed to pay all the charges up front and my payment to get my account back to normal. Only then would they refund my charges. Being stubborn I refused to pay a penny, took down the name and employee ID of the guy on the phone and his manager and made a complaint. There was no way in hell I was paying fines which I shouldn't have had in the first place,just so I can bring my account out of arrears. I explained this to the guy who called re my complaint who escalated it to his manager. I was promised all was well and my next payment would come out as planned. Only it didnt... again. Another call back and I was told the same things again. So I said enough is enough. Made sure the call was recording (my end and theirs) and explained to the manager that I was recoding this call. I explained the situation in great detail for the benefit of the tape and politely said goodbye after I had finished. Within an hour I had a call from a senior manager, he explained there was a technical error on my account, gave me £100 off my card, no payments for three months and rectified my credit account. On top of that he also extended my balance transfer for 6 months. So good outcome in the end but it makes me wonder how many people just accept things like this and how many people don't even notice.
British Gas and Npower for a pretty rubbish customer service department. Finally change supplier to a company who answered the phone within 5 rings and straight to a human not press this number then press that number then grow a beard whilst you wait and not a person with a difficult to understand Asian accent.
Make sure to follow up on this (with the credit agencies) as someone once applied for (and got) a loan in my name with Santander, ran off with the cash while my record was being pummelled. It was sorted out with Santander but they did not remove the bad stuff from my record, which then caused me headaches further down the line when I was failing credit reference checks left right & centre for no reason for simple things like phone contracts. Absolute nightmare
Kronos, you might have had similar experiences, but i have a nightmare of a time dealing with Edinburgh council regarding council tax. In fairness, over my years as a student i had a lot of changes of flatmate. But every time I've been quick to make sure i send them details of what's changed, from what, to what, what differences i think that makes and asked them to confirm. Their standard response is to cancel my direct debit and immediately pass my account to the sheriffs officers. they immediately add 10% and won't stop calling 'til they get the money. At this point the council refuse to talk to me saying i have to deal with them, and they won't discuss the amount or what charges are for as it should be discussed with the council. They then both sit there demanding money and sending increasingly threatening letters. Never mind that Edinburgh council are nigh on impossible to get a human on the phone, but their recorded message is slow and ponderous, with un-skippable notices read out first in case you're calling in relation to something specific (this can be a long list) and every stage is interspersed with 'you can find all of this information and more on our website' and a long slow reading of the URL. I'm also paying an extra few grand on my mortgage because a student account i closed out years ago shows up as having been closed, but with a note saying the received full and final payment did not cover the balance. it covered the balance they told me, if there was more i'd have paid it, but no, it's sat there and the bank can find no record of me having an account with them. after spending 2 days calling through various collections and recoveries departments, i got told to write to a po box in Bradford. I've written twice but never received a reply, and had to go with a different and slightly more expensive mortgage provider. The account should be off my credit report in February (6 years is up), but it's still annoying and costing me money as long as i'm on my current mortgage; you'd expect some form of customer service but i'm pretty certain they just don't want to have to deal with it.
+1 for npower - as a result of me miscalculating my usage when I signed up I ended up over £500 in credit which I asked for back. They took over 2 months to get it done - I won't list exactly what happened but it was entirely incompetence on their part as to why it took so long. Switching away from them was the best thing I ever did.
i lost a flat deposit because npower refused to give me a letter or statement showing i'd paid my account off for that flat, apparently on the grounds i no longer lived at that address and was no longer an npower customer.
i couldn't, i didn't have keys for that flat anymore. wouldn't go with npower for anything again either
Not so much a name and shame more like good service but yeah. I was on the 50mb package that virgin used to offer that eventually got upgraded to 100mb for free. Mine never got auto upgraded bearing in mind this meant I was paying nearly £50 a month for 50mb which is a lot for the speed. Finally managed to get this sorted with virgin and agreed that I would be paying £25 a month for 60Mb. Checked my bill at the end of the month and they had applied a two year discount bringing my bill down to £19 a month.... I Can't complain really. Just wish they'd stop giving in and blocking sites.
I know where you are coming from with Edinburgh city councillors. I emailed three for my area, why we have three I know not, on a major money wasting issue but out of the three only one acknowledged the email the other two did not bother. Then come election time these idiots turned up at my door canvassing. I don't think they will come near my door again in a hurry. Not forgetting the absolute shambles that is the Edinburgh trams.
