This company (Geek Squad) don't appear to know what the word 'terminate' means. My eldest teenage son terminated his phone insurance to Geek Squad by phone. They then denied all knowledge of the phone call, despite the fact that they had carried out another action he had advised them of at the same time. Got the usual "We record all phone calls" - yes, but how can we then prove it!!! So I advised my youngest teenage son to cancel his in writing. He wrote a letter cancelling, which I then dropped in by hand as I happened to be passing the CPW. And, guess what, they are now refusing to accept this termination, because apparently according to their thinking this would be "breaking the Data Protection Act" as I dropped the letter in, and not my son. We have lodged a formal complaint and will take this particular stance by them further. I don't think the Data Protection Act means this, otherwise every single letter delivered by the postal service would break it !!! It seems any excuse, and the staff on the phone are very very arrogant.

My son bought a mobile contract with Carphone Warehouse which included insurance with Geek Squad, which he then decided to cancel. Due to a problem with them ignoring the cancelling of a contract by phone, I told him the best thing to do was to formally write, cancelling the contract, to Geek Squad. This he did, and signed the letter, put it in the envelope and was about to post it. However, as I was meeting a friend for lunch near the Carphone Warehouse in Brighton, I said I would drop the letter in for him. I simply walked in, gave the unopened letter to a guy behind the 'Geek Squad' desk and walked out. However the money was taken for the insurance. Having now telephoned the Geek Squad, they have told him (now prepare yourselves) that 'Under The Terms of the Data Protection Act' they were unable to take notice of his formal written instructions, because I, his mother, dropped the letter in to their shop!!!! Surely this is complete and utter rubbish? What if the letter had been delivered by a nice lady postman? Or my neighbour? Or my dog??? I'm not paritcularly knowledgeable on this but surely as the letter inside had been signed by the contact holder themselves, the messenger of the termination of contract is irrevelant?? The 'Geek' I spoke to on the phone (my son having given them permission to speak to me) also said that they don't accept letters only phone calls! Surely a written termination is legally binding, whether they like it or not? Is it just that this company will look for any reason not to take notification of a cancellation? My son's a student and needs every penny he can have - and I am so loathe to let them get away with saying this!!! Does anyone know some regulation I could quote back at them? And how about a complaint to the FOS - anything that could put them in their place. Do I have to wait for them to do something before I do - they said they were going to put this through their complaints department but that they would not be writing, only telephoning. Thanks - and beware of these people!!!

Now I'm just waiting for the "we need your phone number because".. "there's a parcel waiting for you".. "George Clooney wants to take you out on a hot date" or whatever their latest con is...

Well they won't off me, PGH7447 Now we need to make sure they don't off anyone else!

First post here! Delighted to hear that Ruthbridge have bought up a load of sb debts, as this confirms what I believe and that is that the debt they have been writing to me about for the past two weeks (three letters from the two JE's) is statute barred. Found out all about these delightful people by googling them (not that I was worried for one minute!). I am going to take utter pleasure in completing IGNORING everything they send me, will keep you posted, and hopefully this may help the more vulnerable and worried amongst the public to realise that these people can DO NOTHING apart from harrass, threat and frighten Will keep you posted!