Phones and moans one for Buzby...........

[dogtc]

Hi
I bought a nokia 6280i phone from a company in Swansea called ST1000 and the phone on an 18 month contract with the 3g network. To cut a long story short, the phone only worked for a couple of weeks, I refused a repair initially as I wanted another phone altogether as the model is notorious for failing, everyone I know who had this phone have had problems with it. 3G said no way, ST1000 have ignored all my calls and letters after telling me to just claim on my insurance, which I paid in full at time of purchase. The fault is not of my doing so I didn't see why I should have to pay a £45 excess when it is under warranty but they weren't going to play ball. Eventually without a phone, I refused to pay my monthly bill and debt collectors were threatened so I had to pay up. I am aggrieved as I am deaf and use my phone constantly for my business and social use. My sim card was destroyed when 3g scrambled it when I used it in an unlocked mobile from another network so I lost all my contacts and info gathered over the years. They refused to give my puk code so I could transfer my number to another network so all my customers for six months were ringing a dead number and thinking I had packed in the business didn't bother any more. I have had to take out advertising which I haven't had to do for years and so far I estimate by the time that my contract has expired, I will have paid over £800 for a phone which I used for a couple of weeks. In fact I have used about 20 minutes of call time since I had it. I have contacted every organisation I can think of. Trading standards are investigating ST1000 and they told me not to bother taking them to court as although I would win, I won't get a penny out of them. 3G don't give a monkeys that I am paying for fresh air, as long as they get their money. I have written to my mp to complain about this duel system of selling phones and air time, as one is useless without the other but it means I still have to pay for it. Is there anyone else out there who has had experience of this. A work colleague had exactly the same thing happen and she told the debt collectors to get stuffed, but her dad had to pay her contract up to get them off her back. I found your site on google and I hope that you good people can help me here. I have another consumer problem but that is for another time.
Thanks for reading this
Mags
Swansea

[MARTIN3030]

Wow you have got a reason for being here lol
Welcome to the site
Gonna move your thread to the Telecoms forums where I am sure you will be looked after
Post again in the welcome forum for your other issues

[buzby]

Shame you've had all this trouble, and you can see how easy it is for this to roll out of control. The problem is your phone useage was not conditional on the 3UK (not '3G') contract. You don;t say what phone it was, but if a Nokia any Nokia Service Centre would have sorted the problem if your own dealer wouldn't.

A PUK code, incidentally simply unblocks 3's SIM card, it has nothing to do with transferring the number to a different network - that is called 'Porting'. You don't say how long ago this happened, but if your original dealer is still trading, you pursue him via Small Claims under SOGA with the goods not being fit for purpose. This always assumes they don't say the phone cannot have a warranty repair to to misuse.

And Martin, do you never go to bed?

Moving onto 3UK, even if your phone is faulty, your contract still runs, so not paying your bill leads to formal disconnection and charges for early termination, all of which they would win as it is covered by contract law. Add to this your credit record being tagged with a default, you really need to sort this out in association with them, who are the only people capable of removing the default.

[MARTIN3030]

Ha Ha .......yes of course I go to bed Raymond
Just dont spend as much time there as most people