HI, thanks for getting back to me, no I have not taken it any further yet, I wanted to get an informed view on my position which I do not have yet. If you have any ideas let me know. Thanks

Hi Conniff Thanks for that. By this do you mean that the onus is on me to prove what I said, I did make no contract a condition of the upgrade so I know what the recording says, what I am saying. I will do this and it is a good idea since then I will have proof that I dont have a contract, however I dont believe they tape all conversations. What if they havent taped it?

HI all Can anyone advise please I am being harrassed by Virgin. I phoned up Virgin to discuss my services and a lady offered me a very good deal to stay with Virgin. I accepted on the explicit condition that I would not be forced into a new 12 month contract. She agreed and I agreed the Virgin VIP Service. I confirmed my no new contract condition many times and then agred to upgrade my services. Months later I was getting very upset with the way they were treating me and phoned up to ask about cancelling my service and was informed that it was their view that I was in contract untill May 2009, I exlained that my contract expired in 2008 March, they said they would look into it. They didnt get back to me so I wrote explaining what had been said on the phone and enquiring and stating that it was unacceptable for them to enforce a contract that I did not make. Their response was that they had sent me a contract confirmation (I never received this and do not believe it was sent) and since the right to cancel for that I never received was not returned to them I have "automatically entereed into a 12 month contract". To add insult they go on to say. "As a valued customer if you wish to downgrade your current oackage, I'm more than happy to arrange this for you. HOwever, this means you will then enter into a new 12 month contract." How can not sending something you have never received constitute a contract especially when I explicitly said no contract as condition of change of services. How do I defend myself against this. Sorry if this has been read on another part of the site but since no-one responded I felt this may be a better place. Thanks for any help anyone can offer. Rick

HI all Can anyone advise please I am being harrassed by Virgin. I saw that Sky were offering a good deal on services and phoned up Virgin to discuss. I eventually got through to a lady who offered me a very good deal to stay with Virgin. I accepted on the explicit condition that I would not be forced into a new 12 month contract. She agreed and I agreed the Sky Max Service. I confirmed my no new contract condition many times and then agred to upgrade my services. Months later I was getting very upset with the way they were treating me and phoned up to ask about cancelling my service and was informed that it was their view that I was in contract untill May 2009, I exlained that my contract expired in 2008 March, they said they would look into it. They didnt get back to me so I wrote explaining that it was unacceptable for them to enforce a contract that I did not make. Their response was that they had sent me a contract confirmation (I never received this and do not believe it was sent) and since the right to cancel for that I never received was not returned to them I have "automatically entereed into a 12 month contract". To add insult they go on to say. "As a valued customer if you wish to downgrade your current oackage, I'm more than happy to arrange this for you. HOwever, this means you will then enter into a new 12 month contract." How can not sending something you have never received constitute a contract especially when I explicitly said no contract as condition of change of services. How do I defend myself against this. Thanks for any help anyone can offer. Rick

Hi There Thanks for that, I have had a look at the Acceptable Use Policy, and it gives 2 exampes, sending spam or racist remarks. All prety much clear cut unacceptable things to do. But this enginneer said that in a recent meeting he had been told that if people used to much download then they would have there Broadband download speed capped. Virgin advetise on the back of an unlimmitted download allowance so I would find it hard to see how they could cap on the bassis of something that was the core of their service provision. The fact that you have unlimmited usage. I think that this is something important and have a feeling that something may be going on, as well as dissatisfaction with the Enginneer and Virgin on a personal note. Can anyone advise if they have heard about the cap?? Rick

HI there I recently upgraded to 20mb connection. When I checked my speed on a range of testers it appears that I am only getting between 4mb and 10mb, with a max of 15mb. Mostly 4mb. I call Virgin and they pass me onto a premium number that as of yet I dont know if will be charged for. They organise a technitian for today. He comes round and I phone home to speak to him. First thing he says is that my connection has been capped due to Braodband downloads thresholds being reached by me. and that capping is a policy by Virgin and its in my contract. I tell him that: 1: No one has informed me of this. 2: I have only just upgraded to 20mb from 2mb and am paying for this and he says that it is capped, this is contracturally wrong. 3: I tell him that the telephone people did not say this and said that he would resolve the issue. 4: I tell him that he must resolve the issue and I want the 20mb connection I asked for. 5: I tell him that if he is saying that I am capped and that he cannot get my connection speed right, he should leave this his story in writing so that I can take it up with the telephone team. He says: 1: He will leave a nhte 2: And he is looking at the machine. I phone techincal premium rate support and they tell me there is no cap on my service. I say: 1: Phone technician round my house now since he says that this is the reason for my slow connection. They say: OK I phone the technician 20 minutes later and say: 1: There is no block on the speed. 2: Did they phone you. 3: How comes you cant check if there is a block on my speed. 4 Can you phone me before you leave to let me know if you have fixed the connection. He says: 1: Can I have the number of techinical services 2: He does not have a number that he can contact. 3: He will phone before he leaves. Final outcome: He leaves, my speed is still less than 5 mb, he tells my wife everything is good, no note left, my computer settings are left haywire. I am sure I have missed loads of relevant bits but this gives you a quick and probably too long note. WHAT DO I DO NOW??? We should not accept caps on and as much as you like connection at a given speed, and we should expect the speeds we pay for. This needs to be dealt with. Any help greatly appreciated Thanks and regards, Ricklee

Thanks a lot people, its very kind of you to be of help. This is what I think so supports what I wanted to say. ScarletPinpernel, thanks for the letter suggestion, it is very good, very much like one I had already drafted but better. What a great communitty this is. Regards and thanks, Ricklee

Dear All I made a request under the data projection act subject access report for all infomatiom to be sent to me relating to myself in any medium to my housing association landlord. I believe am entitled to a copy of the information. My housing association has responded giving me a copy of their policy to invite me to view the record in the presence of the Area Housing Manager at their Head Office and that wherever possible photocopying facilities will be made available. I have had a quick but not detailed look at their policy document and it says that the Data Protection Act gives individuals the stautory right to see and check details about themselve that are held in the form of computerised data and that for tenants of local authorities this extends to manual records under the Acces to Personal File (Housing) Regulations 1989. I do not know much about the data protection act, however, I was of the understanding that it allowed me to receive copies (ie photocopies) of all information in any form, be it emails, letters, internal memos etc. I want to send them a letter saying very simply. RE your letter. The Data Protection Act works at a level above you own policies, please send me all information as per my request dated -- -- -- under the act as per my letter. If you require any further information on how to comply with my request I refer you to the Act. Please comply within the time period allocated under the act. Regards DOes anyone know where I stand please? Any help greatly appreciated Thanks Ricklee:confused:

I made a request under the data projection act subject access report for all infomatiom to be sent to me relating to myself in any medium to my housing association landlord. I believe am entitled to a copy of the information. My housing association has responded giving me a copy of their policy to invite me to view the record in the presence of the Area Housing Manager at their Head Office and that wherever possible photocopying facilities will be made available. I have had a quick but not detailed look at their policy document and it says that the Data Protection Act gives individuals the stautory right to see and check details about themselve that are held in the form of computerised data and that for tenants of local authorities this extends to manual records under the Acces to Personal File (Housing) Regulations 1989. I do not know much about the data protection act, however, I was of the understanding that it allowed me to receive copies (ie photocopies) of all information in any form, be it emails, letters, internal memos etc. I want to send them a letter saying very simply. RE your letter. The Data Protection Act works at a level above you own policies, please send me all information as per my request dated -- -- -- under the act as per my letter. If you require any further information on how to comply with my request I refer you to the Act. Please comply within the time period allocated under the act. Regards

Dear Mr ---- Thank you for your e-mail regarding your BT account. I sincerely apologise if this bill has caused any confusion. Upon checking your account I can advise that the account has been canceled and BT will no longer charging for services on this line. I can advise you to ignore this bill as it was generated and sent in error. The amount has been canceled by my colleague on the 12/06/07 unfortunately they were unable to contact you on this date to advise you of this however a letter has been posted advising you of the actions they took and this should arrive shortly. Once again accept my apologies for all the problems encountered with BT recently and I would once more like to assure you that you do not have any outstanding balance owing. Thank you for contacting BT. Yours sincerely, eContact Customer Service So as you can see BT did not agree that this was "brinkmanship' and I am not sure if they took a softer approach or agreed contracturally more with the arguments that I put to them than the Consumer Action Group communitty who responded. Whilst i appreciate all your time, I am surprised at the negative responses I got, sugggesting i should pay 12 months service for a service I never received and was entitled to cancel I felt.

Buzby Besides the contract terms and conditions I dont understand why you feel that the terms I agreed on the phone, that until service starts I can cancel dont run above a letter sent to me that I havent signed and that arrived on start date, and why I should have to prove it. BT need to show tha there is a contract for me, as I said before. "I understood contract law meant that the person who is wishing to enforce the contract must prove or show that the contract exists and what the bassis of it is, otherwise I could just phone a random number and alledge that the person who answered the phone had agreed to give me 1000 pounds in return for my advice on life and then tell them to prove that they had not agreed, I find it ludicrous to suggest that I have to prove that BT had agreed the conditions on the phone. It simply does not make sense. "

www.bt.com/pricing/reservice/conditions Relevant extracts BT RESIDENTIAL STANDARD TERMS Your rights to cancel your agreement and return equipment 12. You may cancel your agreement with us before we have provided the service, unless the service terms say otherwise. If you do so, we will not charge you. BT Telephony Services service terms Ending your agreement for the service 6. You may end your agreement for the service without paying a charge for doing so if the price you pay for the service increases by more than the rate of inflation. If you ask us to we will also pay you back any extra charges you have paid as a result of the increase. However, you must let us know within seven days of receiving your bill that: you want to end the agreement; and you want a refund. Ending the agreement 19. You may end your agreement for the service without paying a charge if the price you pay for the service increases by more than the rate of inflation. If you ask us to, we will also pay you back any extra charges you have paid as a result of the increase. However, you must let us know within seven days of us telling you about the increase that: you want to end the agreement; and you want a refund.

Sorry forgot, the only things I agreed to were that I could cancel up and till the service was running and that the enginneer would be coming on the 05/06/07.

The letter was dated 30/05/07 and this was the first correspondence I received, it was received on the 5/06/07. Also I sent a recorded delivery letter to BT on the 4th with screenprints of all emails sent to them through there site, inlcuding the pre 12am (04/06/06) cancellation. This also sent to Ofcom, and my other provider also informed on the 04/06/07 and blocked BT from taking the line, so they never actually initiated the service at all.

Buzby the BT letter is as follows Dear Mr As agreed, bla bla bla You will be connected to the BT network on 5 June 2007, provided you Telephone Operator has made you telephone number available to BT bla bla bla If you have any questions a=or want to cancel your order before we provide you with the service please call us on the number above. Our residential service willo be provided under the terms and conditions which you can see at Welcome to bt.com. If you would bla bla bla. Yours sincerely Jilian Lewis Managing Director Consuimer How do you interpret this, also I received this after the 4th of June when the contract was due to start. Jampot, I do not know if the contract regulated by the Distance Selling Regulations, if it is does that mean that I can use cooling off period contract rights?

Pkea and Buzby, firstly thanks to you both for taking the time. Pkea after not being able to get through on the phone I sent an email before 12am the deadline they used for refusing to cancel. Buzby I will transcribe the letter on this thread on Monday and you can see the wording for youself. Also Buzby and Pkea, I understood contract law meant that the person who is wishing to enforce the contract must prove or show that the contract exists and what the bassis of it is, otherwise I could just phone a random number and alledge that the person who answered the phone had agreed to give me 1000 pounds in return for my advice on life and then tell them to prove that they had not agreed, I find it ludicrous to suggest that I have to prove that BT had agreed the conditions on the phone. It simply does not make sense. Also Buzby and Pkea, they arranged with me that the engineer would come out to do the work on the 5th, and this was the pre-installation process they told me would be done, so as far as what work I was told would need to be done, I did attempt to cancel before this date was arranged. I am not sure of the cooling off contractural obligations of BT, does anyone know how this affects this case?

Jampot, I was told of these conditions on the phone. and the conditions I agreed to were that I could cancel before the service starts and that the date for the start was agreed by me to be the 5th, I tried to cancel on the 4th. I did not agree to any other contractural condictions and was not informed of any, does that mean that I have agreed to them anyway you think?

Whilst I appreciate your time in giving an opinion, Buzby, I am not sure what you mean, I phone BT, they tell me that untill the service is up an running I can cancel, they tell me that the date will be the 5th of June when they will book an enginneer in, I phone on the 4th and they have changed the date? and its my fault they have brought the date forward of the start of a contract? I have it in writing from them that they will connect me on the 5th and cancelled on the 4th. Thats not brinkmanship its a contractural arrangement. I also think I have rights under other parts of the law to cancel.

Today I got a letter and bill from BT the letter says that my provider has informed them that I do not wish to procedd with the order and the bill is for the full year of the contract that was cancelled. Any ideas on how to deal with this?

Hi all I was planing to switch service providers so called BT to organise a line, I checked with them the cancellation policy and they said anytime before it the service is running. They arranged for my service to start on the 05/06/07. They refused to cancel on the 04/06/07 stating that because the engineer had already done work I could not cancel and that I needed to cancel 24 hours before, the letter they sent me says you will be connected on the 5th and if you want to cancel your order before we provide you with your srvices please call us on the number above (received this on the 5th mind you). Phoned my provider and they said BT are taking my line today and they are not sure if they can stop it, BT taking the line against my will. I believe this is a breach of personal, BT and coolling off standard contract conditions. Can anyone help, Its cost me time and money and I also think they should pay as they make us pay. Some details bellow. My current service provider convinced me to stay with some financial incentive. I then tried to phone BT, they never answer their phone and when they did they could not trace my account with my post code or name. On the 04/06/07 I thought I must get through today or I will end up with a contractural problem. So I phoned and phoned and waited and waited after 1 and a bit hours managed to speak to someone and after being passed around country to country and person to person, they looked and looked and couldnt find my account and told me it didnt exist, they were persistant though and finally found my account and came back with the refusal to cancel on the above grounds. I have an email sent to them at 9.30amon the 4th asking to cancel and various complaints made during the day about them not answering the phone and refusing to cancel, I yesterday also sent a letter to OFCOM, my current service provider and BT (registered mail) about the matter. OFCOM say they dont deal with individuals, I would like to know what they do, since BT and others think they can do what they want. Consumers are at the merci of all the service providers and government and they supervisery bodies seem to just let this go on and on. How can companies not answer phones for more than 5 minutes, its a disgrace never mind the other stuff.

This is related to the original post so I think its OK here. Sorry this is so long, first post and not sure if this is OK, cant think of a short way to say it. I know how you feel, the staff at BG are unbelievable, they lie, lie and do all sorts and no-one at BG seems to care, in fact I think they encourage it, calls not logged and no responsibility. Thats how they get away with it. Please see bellow my story. I phoned BG and asked for an up to date bill on my Gas account since I had recently had a meter reading for my Electric and Gas and subsequently receivd a £360 demand for payment for the electric and endkess trouble after that since they tried to force me to pay £100 a month. Since I hadnt heard anything about the gas I wanted to know what was happening. They said that I had to wait for the quarterly bill since I was on a payment plan. I said OK then cancel the payment plan send the bill and we can organise a new payment plan once I know how much I owe. I never received the bill then received an Enforcement notice for £500 + bill. I phoned and explained that I hadent paid since I hadnt received a bill and asked them to pause the enforcement action, they refused. I then contacted energy watch to explain that I couldnt pay a bill I hadnt received and asked them to get BG to pause enforcement until I got the bill. They seemed to agree with BG that this was not possible but said they would contact BG anyway. I then got a meaningless apology letter from BG. Then the bill came, I phoned and tried to arrange a payment plan and they said since my last payment plan had been cancelled (by them, can you believe that) they couldnt do it. I said well I cant pay it, (the reason it was so high was because of poor estimate and a disputed payment that took months to sort out because the Customer Services are a shambles). She cam back and said that I must give a new reading, I gave her this and it seems my use has doubled since the meter was read and I know owed £800. She demanded £160 a month as a take it or leave it and it was that or a prepay rip-off meter. I accepted and said it as only to stop action for now, then promptly received a late electronic demand for the payment that they charged me £10 for. I now owe them over £1000 (gas and electric), I was paying them £100 a month (Gas and Electric) and cannot change supplier since I owe them. This company is a sham and treats us worse than the banks. I wait 20 min plus on the phone when they actualy answer, for all this and have had the staff put the phone down on me and all sorts. Energy Watch doesnt seem to stop them although they do get on top of individual cases. I feel powerless to do anything. There is more to this, lots of abuses of corporate power but this post is already far to long. They really dont care at all. Seems they have me pretty tied up, I cannot afford the £230 a month they are forcing me to pay them, and dont see why they can dictate the time it takes to pay back since they let the debt accrue and not me. Sorry this doesnt help the original post but it does expand on what is going on at BG. Any ideas???