Hi buzby, I will not try not to pay them anything since it will affect my credit file. But like you said, it is just incompetence and it is driving me nuts. Now they made the mistake, not once, not twice, but I lost count of the number of times. Maybe it is time to make them sweat a bit. MCOL is a threat to them, because if I do go down that route, it will be not just for the £10 difference. It will be for time taken for me to try and resolve the matter, which still have not being sorted. Travel costs to get to the O2 shop as instructed by them. And of course court costs. Mention of contacting Trading Standards in the first letter should work. I do not want a credit line from them, since I cannot be sure that they will do it correctly, as like you said, incompetence. I want them to refund me the money within 7 days. Failing which, I will bill them all the items listed above. As discussed in the bank charges part of this forum, claiming for time spent can be included in the claim amount too. I want to make them sweat, and I want to set the terms. As discussed by another person on this forum, O2 set a 14 days refund period. That is not acceptable to me too, since they make the mistake, they cannot tell me to accept their terms. Unreasonable? Maybe, but they did p**sed me off more than once for this matter. And as a footnote, the contract maybe void, since there is no alvinlwh living at Flat X, That Road anyway. Even after repeated attampts to correct it, the address is still incorrect. I think they are on the loosing end if I do decide not to pay. What I am doing now is just typing a very nasty letter to them, and actually I kind of enjoy doing it.

Went to an O2 shop to upgrade my phone a few weeks ago. Signed up for O2 500 plan, which cost £40 per month. However when I checked the paperwork a few days later, I realised that I was set up on the O2 700 plan instead, which cost £50 per month. Phone up the (as usual, useless) customer service, which told me me to go to my local O2 shop to get it sorted. Went to my local O2 shop, got the documents photocopied and was told that it will be done tomorrow. However revieved a bill today, and guess what? I am still on O2 700 and am being billed for it. Now this is not the only problem O2 is causing me, for some reason, sometime in November last year, my address had been changed and I received no mail from them at all. My correct address should be: Flat X 123 That Road X12 3XX For some reason it the house number, 123, had been removed from my address. I had pointed this error out while in the shop, and was told that it will be corrected. The phone I signed up for is the O2 Orbit, which comes with CoPilot software if I am on a tariff of £40 or more. However with the incorrect address, the software will not be sent to me. There are 2 Flat Xs within that postcode, why would I want to remove my house number? When I called the manager of the O2 shop I signed up in up, he got the nerve to suggest that it is my fault! Then I finally reieved my CoPilot software, 7 days late, the address is now: 123 That Road X12 3XX Talk about idiot customer service staff! Called them up again, and tried to get it changed. Those idiots asked for my postcode, and decleared my address correct! Told them it is not and changed it again. Now I got my bill today, which is: Flat 123 That Road X12 3XX And of course, there is this little problem of billing me the wrong about for O2 700 instead of O2 500 I signed up for. Good thing is I have got all the paperwork, I am sending off a letter to their complaints department giving them 7 days to respond. If not I will be billing O2 for: Difference in calling plans Time taken for me to try and resolve these problems Travel costs to get to an O2 shop to try and resolve it. If I do not see my money back in 14 days, it is off to MCOL again!

Just got a letter reguarding my Amazon Credit Card today, they told me that my interest rate will be increased by 15p/£100/month. There had been some talk that with banks loosing money from us getting our fees back and/or unable to make profits from high charges, they will take other steps to protect their profits. Interest rates will be increased, free banking will end. Is this the begining? Feel free to discuss. PS I had not claimed anything for my Amazon Credit Card, so it is not due to my action, in this case.

Hi, I just learn that I can claim back some tax from the Inland Revenue for professional fees paid in relation to my work. These fees are not paid for by my employer. How do I go about doing this? I tried google-ing for it and got a load of tax services company instead. I was told that I have to write a letter. Is there a form for this? Thanks

I just had an idea, instead of marking the latest mail "Return to Sender, Not at this address", I forwarded it instead. The return address on the back is to some PO box in London. But I have the name and address of the person at the bank who had communicated with, whom had assured me that the person's name will be removed and I shall not be bothered again. Well, I forward the letter of demand over to him at Glasgow instead. Lets see how he like that one!

Right, I will first go to PC World with my credit card bill. Thanks for all the help and useful info.

Right thanks for all the replies. If all else fails (read somewhere else that Creative does NOT even honor warranty WITH receipt!) it is off to MCOL I suppose?

"i doubt it would. get a copy of your credit file and check there are no financial links and if there are - dissassociate yourself." I know how to get a credit file, but how to 'dissassociate' myself? Also can I make the bank send me a copy of my file, on the basis that they did make a threat directed towards my 'household'? I am quite sure the threat is illegal/improper, so surely I shouldn't have to pay for the credit file myself. "stick to your guns, they will soon give up. you could consider getting a statutory declaration signed to state that they no longer live there perhaps? a bit extreme but good for peace of mind i guess. make sure the electoral role is updated too!" Actually I will consider sticking a gun in their face if they dare to come around calling. Well, sadly, I do not have a gun... How do I get a statutory declaration? And most importantly, how much will it cost me? I am sure her name is not on the electoral roll.

Hi, I bought a MP3 player a few months ago. It is a new model released less than a year ago. After only about 3 months, it stop working. Problem is I have lost the receipt and therefore cannot prove the date of purchase. HOWEVER as I stated, it is a model less than a year old. Also I had paid by credit card, which I still had the statement. I seem to remember something about 'if the retailer refuse to repair or refund, the credit card company must do it' under Consumer Credit Act of something like that? Any suggestions here?

Hi all, Some of you may remember me posting here about a 'friend' who owe me some money. Well this post is about the same person, but a different debt. This person had a loan with RBS of about £2000. She had defaulted on the loan and of course the bank is now chasing her for the money. She no longer live at my address but clearly had not informed the bank, so the letters are coming to my address. In one of these letters, the bank said 'The Group and other companies may use the record of default and any other information provided to the agencies when considering application by you, or other members of your household, for facilities including motor, household, credit life and general insurance.' It also threaten to get a court order to recover the fund, which may (not specified in the letter, but we all know how they work) also involve bailiffs. This rise two issue for me; 1) Why should my credit rating or application for loans, insurances, etc be affected by someone who is no longer in my ‘household’? 2) We all had seen the BBC program on how bailiffs work; just telling them the person does not live there will do no good. So I wrote to RBS telling them that this person does not live at my address anymore, and tell them that since this does not involve me, they have to remove all references regarding my address/household. Their reply was they were not in a position to remove the address from the records unless provided with suitable authority to do so from the original person. Now why would a runner want to do that? It also claims that Default registered will only clearly state that it relates to the original person. Hmmm??? I was also told marking the mail ‘return to sender, not at this address’ is the only way to remove the name from my address. Anyway I recently applied for a Mint card, and for those of you who do not know, Mint is actually part of RBS. My application got rejected; the rejection letter comes on the same day another letter for demand of payment address to this person. What is all this talk about no problems with my credit file? Now RBS had not kept their promise (no surprise here) to remove the name from my address, and probably (I suspect) screwed up my credit reference as well. And their original letter made threats against my household (although not address to me). Surely this is not right and there is something I can do to them about this?

Won full refund of charges, interest and costs. P.S. The correct address to use in England is: HBOS Legal Services-Retail Division Trinity Road Halifax West Yorkshire HX1 2RG Could someone please remove that Royal Bank of Scotland address in the BoS Contact folder? It is not only the wrong address, it is the wrong bank!

It is BoS not RBS that I need

I do not have a local branch. The branch I opened my account at was in Edinburgh and even then it no longer exist.

Good luck getting a reply, I have the same problem here too but no one seem to ever bother to help.

No one?

Can anyone help here?

I am filling in the forms for HMCS website but they state that the address must be in England or Wales. The address I got for BoS is the Dunfermline one, so does that mean I cannot use HMCS? If so what should I do?

LBA sent yesterday, if they think that I will wait 4 weeks and forget about it, they can dream on!

Standard 'we will look into it and get back to you again in 4 weeks' letter recieved today. Well they have 7 more days before LBA.

Now we know why NHS is running out of staff and need to employ sub-standard staff from overseas. They had all moved to Canadia. http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyid=2006-11-14T183022Z_01_N14313540_RTRUKOC_0_US-LIFE-MARIJUANA.xml&src=rss Personally, I do not work in the NHS so that is a non issue to me. But I would love to see how they enforce the 30 minutes rule so welcomed by you. CCTV or bugs to track the smoker? They are reminded to use it, not made to use it. How about enforcing it by, maybe, getting staff to be CONSTANTLY stationed at entrance and toilet cleaning every single hands that enter the hospital? That will surely cut cross infection to almost zero. My issue here had always been, "how far are they going to go?" not just with smoking, but with this nanny state thing. Any people area always saying that a smoker can choose not to be a smoker, but can he/she? As I said earlier, a person could be born a smoker due to smoking parents. Isn't it the same as a handicapped person that is born that way. Non of them have a choice in their parents. So why discriminate against one and not another?

There are 3 issues here, and I will address them seperately. Smoke affecting others: You are correct about the hand scrubs and clean areas of the hospital. HOWEVER how do they enforce it with Joe Public? And how many Joe Public enter the clean areas? You say that smoke can carry all kinds of nasty stuff, which is also correct. My concern how far they want to go? A staff in critical care should have cleaned up anyway, but what about a Joe Public visiting? How far will they go with rules?: I see all the arguement about walking through a cloud of smoke to get into a doorway, but I do not see the arguement about someone smoking in their own vehicles. And if the nasty stuff can hang around for 30 minutes, then what? Ban smoking 30 minutes BEFORE entering the hospital? I obey all rules and regulations as posted, but how far will this go? What will they ban next? Dying? Giving up: As for giving up, well everyone would have their own reasons for doing something or not doing something, I do not feel it is right to tell them what to do. (about giving up that is, not about smoking in a room/building/doorway/etc) Free country. A person who smoke may feel it reduce stress (there is another discussion here about the stress brought on by quitting), have enough money to afford the cigarettes, feel that they had live life enough, etc..., so what is in it for them to give up then? *This para is a seperate issue about giving up so should not be read with the part about smoke affecting others at the top of this post. As for your AIDS example, if you know the person has AIDS, and you still want to have sex, you should take extra steps to protect yourself. Further more, AIDS is not something that can be seen (therefore decleared), unlike cigarette smoke which is visible. So you can avoid a cloud of smoke at the doorway by taking a different route (according to health and safety, it is also your duty to take reasonable steps to protect yourself). BUT I can see your response coming (why should you take a different route?), so I am going on with this suggestion, a seperate external area (not internal smoking room) for smokers away from the general public (back doorway, courtyard, etc). That way you will no longer have to walk thorugh the cloud of smoke. However this still leave the issue of the 30 minutes unresolved. Will they ban smoking 30 minutes before entering the hospital now?

ASSAULT? Now that is strong. Ok then, what are they going to do next to make people washing their hands after visiting the toilets in the hospitals? Or going into the hospital with germs that assault others on their shoes and clothes? Or even in the air they exhuale? It is only EXACTLY the same situation in your eyes.

That is nanny state gone mad, and throw human rights issue into the mix...you get all kind of rules and laws that don't make sense.

They did trued to n schools didn't they?

Inappropriate, in a politically correct sense? Yes, I agree with you. Which is why I put FOR EXAMPLE in bold. Thing is what a person like, another may find it disgusting. I am just using the DDA and human rights as an example of restriction to a person's action, or access. As you said, a person is born disabled, he did not make the choice. HOWEVER, a smoker could be born a smoker too. Studies had show that an unborn child that is exposed to second (or is it third hand in this case?) smoke had a higher chance (cannot remember the %) of being a smoker too. And as for leaving prison, well some work place could be like prison where the employees cannot leave the premises at all. Personally, I do not agree with the human right issues that comes with EU membership. Why should a country set its law based on the decision made by other countries. But that is too a wide discussion for this forum. Even the parliment couldn't work it out.