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Astoundingly enough, I have found a phone company more inept, more incompetent, more irritating, and more irresponsible than BT. After the fiasco of July to September 2006, I would not have thought it possible. Yet it is true: TalkTalk takes the metaphoric cake for utter idiocy!
The way that the morons at TalkTalk have handled my request to set up a line in the new flat was shameful enough... and it is the reason why, more than one month after moving, we are still without a landline in our new home. I shall not bore you, gentle readers, with a long and detailed recap of our dealings with these nincompoops. Suffice to say that, after both my beloved![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cheshcat and I spent several fruitless hours on the phone with various departments, I finally gave up, cancelled my request, and shopped about for a new phone company. With any luck, we should have a landline again come on December 13th, the morning after my return from Japan.
One could reasonably think that such would be the end of it, yes? One could... but, alas, one would be wrong. Adding the proverbial insult to injury, the person in TalkTalk's cancellations department failed to properly process my request and thus I was recently billed for a month of phone service that we did not receive. Oi! Not only have attempts to obtain a refund been futile, but even our efforts to switch off the account have proven to be beyond the meager capabilities of TalkTalk's staff. Indeed, it seems quite likely that they are all set to bill us again, later in December, for a second month of service not provided! To prevent this, I bypassed their people and had my bank remove their Direct Debit access to my account. I may not be able to procure a refund, but they shall certainly not pull that stunt again!
In the meantime, I find myself wondering if the United Kingdom has any good consumer watchdog organizations equivalent to, say, the Better Business Bureau. Although I hope that I have, at long last, seen the back of those incapable gits, methinks that this may be too much to expect.[*] As such, hoping for the best and preparing for the worst is a worthy paradigm, and I should assemble the requisite knowledge to arm myself if need be.
[*] My suspicion is that, after refusing to close the account, they will go after my impeccable credit rating when they find that I have prevented them from collecting monies to pay for service that we do not want and are not receiving.
The way that the morons at TalkTalk have handled my request to set up a line in the new flat was shameful enough... and it is the reason why, more than one month after moving, we are still without a landline in our new home. I shall not bore you, gentle readers, with a long and detailed recap of our dealings with these nincompoops. Suffice to say that, after both my beloved
cheshcat and I spent several fruitless hours on the phone with various departments, I finally gave up, cancelled my request, and shopped about for a new phone company. With any luck, we should have a landline again come on December 13th, the morning after my return from Japan.One could reasonably think that such would be the end of it, yes? One could... but, alas, one would be wrong. Adding the proverbial insult to injury, the person in TalkTalk's cancellations department failed to properly process my request and thus I was recently billed for a month of phone service that we did not receive. Oi! Not only have attempts to obtain a refund been futile, but even our efforts to switch off the account have proven to be beyond the meager capabilities of TalkTalk's staff. Indeed, it seems quite likely that they are all set to bill us again, later in December, for a second month of service not provided! To prevent this, I bypassed their people and had my bank remove their Direct Debit access to my account. I may not be able to procure a refund, but they shall certainly not pull that stunt again!
In the meantime, I find myself wondering if the United Kingdom has any good consumer watchdog organizations equivalent to, say, the Better Business Bureau. Although I hope that I have, at long last, seen the back of those incapable gits, methinks that this may be too much to expect.[*] As such, hoping for the best and preparing for the worst is a worthy paradigm, and I should assemble the requisite knowledge to arm myself if need be.
[*] My suspicion is that, after refusing to close the account, they will go after my impeccable credit rating when they find that I have prevented them from collecting monies to pay for service that we do not want and are not receiving.
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That said, however, I have yet to reach the conclusion that we have the choice of more than one competent land-line phone company!
Indeed, to take it a step further, I am not even certain that we have one that fits such a description.
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I get by with only a cell phone and a VOIP line via Lingo that my company pays for (and which will therefore be going away in January).
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Well said, my friend!
I get by with only a cell phone and a VOIP line via Lingo that my company pays for
We get our home broadband from the same connection as the landline, I'm afraid. So for the past month, we have been without both... though my mobile broadband dongle has proven rather useful in the interim.
With any luck, Dec 13 will see us reconnected again. We shall find out...
Meanwhile, what is your plan for home phone after January? Will you abandon the concept entirely and simply rely on the cell?
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Once I'm not doing the tech support gig anymore, I'll be back in the position of not having a need for it.
My internet service is via DSL, but it's a naked line without voice service. There's a really good deal for both together, but I don't actually need voice over copper here, and it is a little bit cheaper without it. Internet connectivity in Chicago in general is rather more expensive than it was in Wisconsin; I was pretty surprised when I first looked into it.
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Well it always works for my brother-in-law anyway. He always speaks to and/or writes to the top person in the company.
Personally I have had no problems with them and would be happy to recommend them, but then I havent had to ask them to change anything as for me they did it right the first time.
Best of luck.
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For just one example: A few weeks ago, one of their internal people agreed to listen to a forty-five minute phone call that had taken place (at the cost of ten quid to me for calling their 0870 number on my mobile phone) between me and four different people in four different departments. She reported back that I had been lied to repeatedly and given a complete runaround. She was shocked and said that she had never seen such a thing. Then she said she would discuss with her manager what sort of compensation could be arranged and that she would phone me back.
Think I ever got the call?
Anyway, I consider myself done with them, as I have switched providers and cancelled their direct debit access. I have e-mailed them to tell them as much. Reluctantly, I feel that I must consider the twenty-three quid charged for a month of service that I did not receive to be a donation made to support their idiocy. My only concern now is what happens when they try to take another payment and find that they cannot. It is not my fault if they cannot process a simple order -- made multiple times now -- to turn off the account! I am not paying them the equivalent of another dime![*] If and when they target my credit rating, I want to be educated enough to protect myself.
[*] About 6.5p
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So noted... and thank you! I have a suspicion that this little tidbit of information[*] is going to come in rather useful in a few weeks!
[*] Does information -- or anything else, for that matter -- ever come in large tidbits??
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Of course, being a loyal American, I could always engage my right to bear arms and bring some semi-automatic weaponry to their head offices. Perhaps in the new millennium, "going telephonal" is the new going postal (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=going%20postal)? ;-D
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Watchdog (http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/gotastory/) may be interested as well - I think they are pretty feared by phone companies and if they've had a fair few complaints about them I think they can be quite effective so it may be worth getting in touch :-)
x
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*big hugs* for the stressyness of all this.
Love you!
xxxxxxx
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As I said in a comment above, I'm pretty much done with TalkTalk. I accept -- albeit reluctantly -- that I'm not going to get a refund for the November phone service that I paid for but did not receive. And I am finished trying to convince them to close the account. No more time and energy is going into trying to get results from those imbeciles! With my direct debit barred to them, they will receive no further monies from me and that's that.
The only concern now is what they do when they try and fail to take the December payment on the account that they cannot seem to switch off. Hence the gathering of consumer watchdog information. If they try to besmirch my credit rating, I fully intend to fight back. If, however, they finally leave me alone... well, then, the matter is done. We shall see!
Love you lots, Sweetheart!
xxxxxxxx
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It's a pain in the bottom to prosecute, fortunately you don't have to.
Because you're paying by direct debit, you have the direct debit guarantee on your side. Just call your bank and state that the charge was applied by TT in error, and could they please refund it. Your bank will refund on the spot and then pursue it back from TT. If TT try to fight it it comes down to their word vs yours and at that point the fact they've billed you for service not received becomes your trump card.
In the meanwhile, phone your bank and say "I'd like to have this debit reversed under the DD guarantee".
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Not long ago, you prevented me from purchasing a car with an unreliable engine (the 1.8l K-series Rover 400). Now, after I had given up hope of getting a refund from TalkTalk, you point out a simple and effective means of accomplishing that. Once more, I thank you!
I'm in Japan until the 12th, but I've already made note in my diary to phone the bank on the morning of the 13th. Excellent!
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That's not all they do, but it's a useful approximate description relevant to this post.
The site is http://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/cabdir.ihtml
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Other than that, how's you, sir? What have you been up to since last we met, about five weeks ago? When I'm back from Japan and the States next month, we should get together for some more ringing. Is Hampstead on Wednesday still a practice night?
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