Hi Suzy

You need to write an Account in Dispute letter. Tell them that no new agreements were entered into, they were not sent any documentation and no further monies will be paid.

Send it Recorded.

Once you've done the letter can you post it up.

Will do, thanks for the advice and the 'other avenue to resolution' (ispa) did not know about that one. Might not get the letter on until tomorrow now but will get stuck in in the morning.

Thanks again.

I have written the letter as advised after going through a lot of other posts to get ideas on the wording. I have not sent it yet, thought it best to let you have a look at it first so you can let me know if you think I have left anything out or need to add anything else. Many thanks again for you help and advice.

8 June 2012

Supanet

TCS Support Centre

Time Technology Park

Blackburn Road

Burnley BB12 7TW

Dear Sir/Madam

With reference to your letter demanding the following

Remainder of contract £139.90

Cancellation fee £39.99

Current outstanding balance £13.99

Total to cancel account £193.88

I dispute all of the amounts detailed. The only contract I have ever agreed to with you was 6 years ago so no further contracts have ever been offered or requested since.

The cancellation fee cannot be demanded as there was no contract to cancel since the only one I have ever agreed to expired 5 years ago. Since the new laws regarding these contracts came into force I have not agreed to any new contract with you. I have never asked for or received any upgrades or downgrades to my service which may have ‘assumed’ a new contract with you.

I do not owe you any outstanding balance as you have been paid for all the time that you were supplying my broadband and for approximately a further 2 weeks beyond that.

I would ask that no further contact be made concerning the above account unless you can provide evidence as to my liability for the sums in question.

I await your written confirmation that this matter is now closed. Otherwise I will have no option but to make a complaint to Trading Standards and also inform the Office of Fair Trading of your actions.

Yours faithfully

Hi suzy

Thats fine, very succinct:-)

I've removed the ref. num.

Thanks for that, will print it and send it today by recorded delivery.

We have finally received a reply from Supanet, not their usual - almost by return - but over a week later.

This is what the body of the letter says:-

Thank you for your recent correspondence in relation to the above account.

After investigating your complaint I can confirm that I am unable to find any order confirmation to support our claim of the contract length and therefore agree that your service - although showing on our system as in contract, may not actually be.

I have therefore removed the costs associated with the remainder of the contract and the cancellation fee. I do however require you to pay the monthly cost up until the date of closure: 28/06/12.

This amount due is £14.99 only and can be paid with a card on 0845 120 4473. Alternatively, you may send a cheque or postal order to the address above.

I do hope this is a fair solution to your issue, however if there is anything further we can help with then please do not siditate to contact us again.

Bearing in mind the monthly cost was £13.99 and not £14.99 and it was paid 2 weeks before the supply was ceased, they have had 2 weeks beyond the cease date paid for.

Obviously they won't be getting any more money from my neighbours.

Just to make sure it becomes more difficult for them to behave like this to others I have send details to Ofcom and have added feedback about them on some website, one in particular is MoneySupermarket who have added it to their test case archive and asked if we would be willing to speak to journalists about it. Of course we said yes and now hoping to hear more from them in the not to distant future.

Thank you for your support and advice during this disupte, most of it I was able to cope with myself but the 'Account in Dispute' advice was invaluable to me and I wouldn't have know about it without your help.

Well Done Sue.

If they try anything else don't hesitate to post. Shall I mark the thread 'Resolved'?

I am happy for you to mark it as resolved. Once again, thank you.

I doubt that they will try to go to Court for the £14.99 (or £13.99 if they manage to work out how much they think my neighbours owe them), but if they do will certainly share our amusement with you! I am wondering if they may put something with the Credit Referece Agencies when they realise they are not going to get any more money, must remember to check in a few months time.

I think there are thousands of people out there thiinking that they have to pay for broadband contracts that they have not agreed to and haven't got the will or know-how to demand proof of the debt so they just pay it. Over the past few weeks I have read so many postings on websites giving that impression and I bet that most of them are pensioners who have no idea they are being taken for a ride and pay up rather than try to fight it as they don't feel they have the strength to get into a battle with aggressive broadband suppliers.

I shall move on to my next battle now, speaking to my council about a serious breach of Data Protection through not realising they had put the wrong attachment into an envelope disclosing some very personal details about someone we know!.

I may be back sooner than I think .....................

O.K. good luck with that.

I can say that there has never been any email renewing any contract within all the time I had been with them, only an email about monthly bill so they were lying to you. I was a customer of Supanet for 12 years. Service was ok, not fast but ok. I was originally on unlimited broadband £11.99 a month. When they got taken over by a Cyprus company they upped it instantly to £17.99. I stayed as it was unlimited and seemed easier than swapping. Then it went totally crazy. I was called to say usage exceeded but was only a curtesy call to warn me (since when was my unlimted package capped?) however I let it go but the monthly bill shot up (so much for it was only a curtesy call). After some months I was thinking to stop and find another ISP when they phoned to offer a phone and broadband package. It sounded ok so I agreed. OMG what a mistake! Contract came, wrong deal. Phoned up, ok will send another. Wrong again. Phoned (long time on 0845 hold) 3rd contract wrong again. Then date of phoneline changeover came, from BT to Supanet, call quality dropped 50%, could hear clicks and dialling as if I was sharing a line with 20 people. Then phone went completely. Caller display disappeared, 1571 service disappeared. Phone line dead! Broadband dead! I called technical help from another house, they were SO rude. In fact all the customer service people (and I spoke to many) were unhelpful. The tech guy actually said, well I dont know whats wrong and by the way you have a new phone number, I dont want a new number I said, well you have one anyway he said! Can try and get yours back but no promises.' Then said 'and youre not going to like this but I dont know when your broadband will be back on either'. I asked lots of times for explainations why I had no broadband and why contracts were always wrong, and to speak to managers as advised on their own customer charter pdf. I was told, managers are ALL busy in meetings and anyway they dont come to the phone. I was promised (actual word used) one guy would call me back in 10 minutes after checking account. 2 hrs later sitting by the phone - no call. I called (loooooooong time on hold) another person said oh, he shouldnt have said he would call you back. I finally wrote to the headquarters (couldnt face another phone call)saying I am cancelling. I had lost money over Christmas as I sell from home and if anyone wanted to pursue any contract obligations, I would sue them for loss of earnings. As far as I am concerned they did not provide me with any service to pay for. Broadband went down beginning Dec and never came back. I have now switched to BT. My call to get MAC code went as you can expect! YOU CANT LEAVE, you are in a contract!! (oh btw they issued me with contract no4 after last call! I didnt even order anything!) I would like to think this is now over but I have just checked my online billing and guess what?!!! I am over £50 in debt and on the bill are 2 phonelines!!!! They are seriously crazy.I have cancelled the direct debit but remains to be seen what their next move is. Stay away. They are ok so long as you dont mind them having full control and heaven help you if you have a problem. BT in comparison were angels of mercy on the phone. Helpful, knowledgable and respectful.

ps a friend of mine was also with Supanet, when they stopped they agreed to pay £10 a year to keep email address. Meantime they keep trying to charge £10 a month!