Vodafone Complaint with FOS

[albob222001]

Hi, I was hoping to get some opinions as to whether an ombudsman adjudicator opinion on settlement is acceptable or whether I should appeal to an ombudsman.

 

My mother had a contract with Vodafone, in October 2015 the contract was cancelled and I put the number in my name, there was no outstanding balance.

 

In December 2015 my mother received a letter from Vodafone demanding £44.06 outstanding, I immediately went online and complained - I received two emails from Vodafone on December 13th stating no outstanding balance.

 

This non-existent Vodafone debt was passed to a DCA named Zinc group who began chasing my mother. We wrote a recorded delivery complaint to Vodafone and got no response. Once the time limit for going to the ombudsman was reached we went to the communications ombudsman.

 

Zinc group continued to hound my mother until April 15th 2016, despite me informing them and the ombudsman requesting no recovery activity to take place whilst the investigation was carried out. Plus Vodafone have been putting negative entries on my mother's credit file which has seen her score drop by over 150 points in the last few months, it is the only negative entry for her.

 

The ombudsman adjudicator has upheld my complaint, I know this from a communication from Vodafone, I haven't had the ombudsman letter yet.

 

They have instructed Vodafone to clear the false debt, remove negative entries from my mothers credit file, and issue her with £50 compensation.

 

This amount of compensation seems low considering this has been going on for 6 months, I was expecting more like £150. Although I have had many debts, my mother never has had any and this is the first time a debt collector has ever chased her. So it caused her stress and sleepless nights.

 

Since this is my mother I'm pretty angry about the whole thing, so just wanted opinion on whether this is a more than adequate resolution and requesting more comp would be unreasonable, or if I should try for more.

[citizenB]

I think you could issue a small claim against Vodafone and possibly even the DCA.

[silverfox1961]

Hi

If you accept the Ombudsman decision, you cannot then go for more.

 

The only way for you to take court action is for you to reject the Ombudsman findings.

 

The Ombudsman does what they feel is fair, not use the law in it's findings.

[albob222001]

Hi,

 

Thanks for the replies. I have not had a letter from the ombudsman confirming their decision yet; my mother has received a letter from Vodafone today stating they are removing the credit file entries and issuing the £50. They appear to be jumping the gun because nothing has been accepted yet.

 

Does the communication ombudsman follow the same process as the financial ombudsman - i.e. adjudicator investigates first, then appeals can be made to an ombudsman afterwards?

[silverfox1961]

most cases are dealt with by an adjudicator unless it is deemed too serious an issue for the adjudicator to act.

 

In this case, I would assume it is an adjudicator who has made the decision so you can reject the decision and ask for an escalation but to be honest, if an adjudicator has (in the Ombudsmans opinion) made the correct decision, they will not change it.

 

Vodafone will want this settled as quickly as possible as if it did go to court, the court may make a better award however, the Ombudsmans findings may be brought up by VF to show that a reasonable compromise had been reached but that you decided that the compensation offered was too low. The judge may view that and penalise you just as equally may decide you weren't offered enough.

 

So, the options are to accept the offer or reject and go to court where things may not go the way you want.