Well it's taken a while but thanks to the intervention of Lee, this matter has now been resolved and Vodafone has waived all charges applied to my account. They have done this as a goodwill gesture as they say they did not receive the original cancellation letter I sent in July 2011. I am relieved they have taken the common sense approach having seen that I have not actually used the service since June/July 2011 and therefore have not incurred any usage charges. Thanks Lee for your help.

Hi Lee, Will do. I didn't see your email until after I had posted here. I appreciate your efforts. Kind regards Deb Mc.

I have had another email from "customer care" this morning saying that if I want a copy of a bill (I don't!) then I will have to pay £1.54 per bill and that they do not have any copy letters to send me. I think this proves that they didn't reply to my letters despite saying that they had. It does suggest however that they received my letters. Interesting though that they claim not to have received the one cancelling the contract! Thank God they no longer have my phone number as I'm sure Frederickson would have escalated their harrassment by now.

That's a shame. It was worth a shot. It's a pity that your council don't give a discount for second homes or single occupancy to reduce your liability.

Hi, when you moved out of the rented property after one month, did you move all of your furniture out? My local council do not charge council tax on empty property for a period of up to six months so it may be worth checking to see if your council have similar rules.

Automated response reference number #8522972. Thank you.

Hi, I've done that. Just awaiting the automated reply. Thank you everyone for taking the trouble to reply so far.

I’m very disappointed with the response I’ve had from Vodafone as I have been with them for years and thought they were a professional company. However, they are now chasing me for a small debt that I do not owe and, in fact, I think they owe me a small refund which I hadn’t intended to pursue. The facts are: At the beginning of June 2011 I purchased a dongle (for about £20) from Vodafone and entered into a month long contract with them for internet usage, at a cost of £7.50 per month. This contract was cancellable with one month’s notice. I couldn’t get the dongle to work on my computer so after approx three attempts I gave up. I’m not sure if it ever actually connected but I was never able to surf the net using it. It was a waste of £20 plus £15.00 (June and July rental) but I put it down to experience and on 30th June I wrote to them giving them one month’s notice to cancel the contract and for them to send me a final bill. After I couple of months I noticed that they had continued to take the £7.50 by direct debit from my bank account. My own stupid fault I thought as I should have cancelled the direct debit instruction. I duly cancelled the direct debit with my bank and had overpaid Vodafone for August but I thought no more about it as it was only a few pounds. On 23rd November I received a letter from Vodafone chasing me for £22.50 (three months line rental). I later found out that this was for September, October and November. On 1st December I wrote back enclosing a copy of my cancellation letter. On 14th December I received a phone call from Frederickson International (had no idea who they were) asking for my postcode and date of birth. I refused to give those details and they finally admitted they were acting on behalf of Vodafone. I explained that I had written to Vodafone and that I would not talk to anybody on the phone and that I wanted all correspondence in writing so that there would be a record of all communication. For the next three or four weeks I received daily text messages from Frederickson asking me to call them. I will not talk to these people on the phone. I tried texting back but that doesn’t work. There is no fax number on their website. There is no contact email address on their website so I wrote to them but didn’t get a response. On Christmas Eve I received a bright yellow card from them in the post in capital letters “ADDRESS VERIFIED” and pay up or else….or words to that effect. I have since written to Vodafone five more times and not had a response. I also filed a complaint with Vodafone's customer services on their website and a couple of days ago they finally responded by saying that they had not received a cancellation letter from me and that they had replied to all of my letters. I have now received a notice before action letter from Vodafone for the sum of £31.45. It appears they have accepted one of my December letters as the 30 day notice. I replied by email to their customer services department saying that I do not believe that they replied to all of my letters as I would have surely received at least one reply. All of them couldn’t have got lost in the post and I asked them to send me copies of their replies. They replied again repeating what they had said in their first email, that I had not given notice and they had replied to my letters and that £31.45 debt had now been passed to their collections department. Yesterday I responded again sending them copies of all my letters and asking them once again for copies of their responses. They have responded again today giving me instructions on how to pay them £31.45. They clearly do not read the emails! Where do I go from here? I wrote to them giving them notice they say I didn’t. They say they replied to all of my letters but I did not receive one reply. I did not receive a notice before action letter before they set Frederickson International on me (although FI stopped harassing me in January I think - I have since cancelled the phone they were contacting me on). Vodafone have now issued me a notice before action letter and are going to pursue the “debt”. If I had actually used the service I would pay it but I think they are being very unfair. I gave them the required notice and it was ignored. What am I supposed to do? I can afford to pay this money but I don't see why I should as I gave them notice and I haven't used the service. I would rather give the money to charity! I would really appreciate any advice anybody can give me. Thanks.