Sorry about this, few questions!

[La Tristesse Durera]

Hi,

I've been on the moneysavingexpert site for a few months now which is where I found the link to this site. Everyone seems really friendly & helpful, and when I posted the message below on the site I was advised to come to this one. If anyone can help me I'd be massively grateful. My situations below;

I've recently written (on the 13th July) to the companies about unfair charges. Here's the responses:

Halifax; Requested a lot of statements, these have come back to me, I haven't added charges up but it's going to be around £700 at a guess.

AMEX; Sent them a letter requesting a breakdown of charges, and they got back to me saying 'Our charges are fair, end of'. Again, I'd guess £300 in charges here.

Capital One; Argh! Refunded only £96 to my account, which has been passed to a DCA anyway, so I can't even access that money. Again I've probably been charged £££s more, but they've decided to refund this amount. Haven't taken my default off either, said they need to look into this. The default came about bacause of charge after charge and a breakdown in communication.

GE Capital have decided to refund me £165!!!!!!!!
The problem is they've refunded this to the account which has since been passed to a DCA. I'd really prefere a cheque, so I called them but they said it's been adjusted so couldn't do anything. Do you reckon there's anyway I can get my hands on the £165??

Vodafone; Slightly off topic, have a contract which is £25pm for 200texts and 200mins. Doing the same deal for new customers for half of that. I called today giving the 'I've been a customer for 8 years' kind of thing and they wouldn't budge.

If anyone could help on these I'd be massively grateful. To give a bit of background info, I post on the moneysavingexpert site under the same username quite often and am currently in a DMP after racking up about £10k on loans & cc's. I'm only 21 and am aiming to crack through this DMP in about 3 years. If I can get say £1,000 back in claims then I aim to put it towards paying these off.

Many Thanks

[blacksheep1979]

The mobile contract - if you are not currently tied into any contract then call up go through to cancelations and say you want your migration code (to keep your number and move to another network) at this point they'll start asking why etc and just tell them you've found a better deal, they'll soon match almost any deal you can find

[La Tristesse Durera]

Originally Posted by blacksheep1979

The mobile contract - if you are not currently tied into any contract then call up go through to cancelations and say you want your migration code (to keep your number and move to another network) at this point they'll start asking why etc and just tell them you've found a better deal, they'll soon match almost any deal you can find

Yeah tried it unfortunately... they couldn't change my deal as I'm 4 weeks into my new contract (and the adjustment deadline is 2 weeks)... when I said 'Fine, I'll cancel and resign up' I was told that to cancel I'd have to pay up the last 17 months of my contract anyway!!! Nightmare. But Vodafone are bad, I changed my priceplan in December and was quoted 2 really good deals via email from a guy who worked there, and when I chose one he was like 'Oops, I didn't mean this, it was a typing error'.

[blacksheep1979]

Fraid if you're tied into an 18 month contract then there isn't much that can be donw, you will be able to change to a different tarrif after month 9 (I think) but they won't be going all out to offer you special discounts like they would if you weren't in a contract.

By any chance did you buy the new phone/contract over the internet/phone?

[La Tristesse Durera]

Originally Posted by blacksheep1979

Fraid if you're tied into an 18 month contract then there isn't much that can be donw, you will be able to change to a different tarrif after month 9 (I think) but they won't be going all out to offer you special discounts like they would if you weren't in a contract.

By any chance did you buy the new phone/contract over the internet/phone?

No, I did it instore because I've always been wary about these internet companies!

Does anyone else have any idea's on my situation? Ie if someone's received similar letters maybe?

[La Tristesse Durera]

Smooth - All 3 Data Protection Act's sent this week.
Received one from Halifax and will add up monies owed to me later

[La Tristesse Durera]

Ok Guys thanks for the help. Here's an update;

AMEX (3 accounts), sent letter requesting £370 and they posted me a cheque for £280. Is there a letter to send to claim the rest of it?

Capital One, haven't received Data Protection Act request yet. Still they have 40 days so still a few days left. They added £96 to my account however I can't access it as it's been passed to a DCA. Still a lot of work to do here sadly. Really miffed with this one!!

GE Money, refunded £165 to an account that had £420, so now only £260 to pay off. The £165 seems fair so I can't complain.

All priliminairy letters sent 23/08/2006

Halifax, all accounts & cc's Data Protection Act Received apart from one which I wrote back informing them of. No reply on that. Once I receive my last cc statements I'll get me calculator out!!

[PhantomReclaimer]

Originally Posted by La Tristesse Durera

But Vodafone are bad, I changed my priceplan in December and was quoted 2 really good deals via email from a guy who worked there, and when I chose one he was like 'Oops, I didn't mean this, it was a typing error'.

Push the issue - their email may have amounted to an offer and your telling them you wanted it may have bound them legally.

P.

[Bookworm]

Tristesse (love your chosen nick, maybe you'll be proved wrong after a few months here, lol), can you start a separate thread in each relevant forum for each seprate case, and then keep your updates and queries relvant to each case on those threads?

Otherwise, I think you'll find things are going to get really confusing very very quickly.

Once you've done that, let me know, and I'll try to split the answers you've already had to each separate thread, to avoid further confusion.