Future Comms mobile contract - joseph Stickler

[BankFodder]

Do I understand that you haven't sent your letter of claim?

[workaholic duck]

Exactly what I said.

On the same day as I was writing/sending the letter before action, they paid up. 11th Feb.

 

The next one is due on 1st March. During March they promised to pay my early exit fee.

[BankFodder]

The impression I get is that you are being played.

 

It's almost as if this was an example of coercive control.

 

It wouldn't at all surprise me if they are monitoring this forum and this thread and that they are seeing what is being proposed and they are reacting accordingly.

 

Sorry, but I think you are completely wrong. You have handed control back to them just when you are about to show them that you wouldn't take it any more and that you were going to dominate the situation in future.

 

Bad move. Big fail!

[workaholic duck]

No, it was O2 forcing their hand that day. It was confirmed by O2 that the person dealing with my complaint had contacted FC.

They may, or may not be monitoring this thread.

 

The sum owing was paid into my account immediately. So, what did I have to act on? How could I send the threatening letter before action?

 

However, now I don't have O2 to rely on since they can't help me further. Or don't want to.

 

Of course I am being played. Like every other sucker.

[BankFodder]

Sorry, I hadn't read it correctly. I hadn't appreciated that they had paid up.

[BankFodder]

10 hours ago, Mark Edwards said:

Helllo

I am new to this site, I was browsing the web this evening looking for other people’s experiences with future comms 

This situation is very similar to mine. I am 6 months into a £90 a month , 3 year contract, again with the promise of a buy out termination fee £650 but it no sign of a payout , what options ions do I have ? Some advice would be really good

thanks 

mark 

hi, welcome to the forum.

The best thing to do is to start your own new thread and tell your story there. I'm sure that we can help you. It's about time this company – Future Comms – were brought to heel.

Please start a new thread

[workaholic duck]

Mark, please do start your own thread! I am mystified why SO many victims are NOT coming forward. We need to publicly shame this appalling company to save others falling into their trap.

Well, for me, it is 1st of the month and no money sent to my account. A letter before action is on its way.

Mark - as for your early termination fee you have to demand it. They will try and tell you they can withhold it for 180 days. That is up now! Oh, and did you send a copy of your final bill from your previous provider within 14 days? Read the small print on their t&c's (you will only see it on their website - they use the provider's t&c's on your contract!!….just to confuse you). They will probably use that to tell you 'they are not obliged to refund you'. Just another of their clever ruses to keep your money. It truly beggars belief.....get everything in writing (they hate it and most can't spell) but insist.

 

[BankFodder]

I suggest that in respect of the next forthcoming payment deadline, that you send a letter before action in which the 14 day deadline is scheduled to expire a couple of days after that payment date. – Maybe three days.

In the letter before action you should explain that you are taking this very assertive action because of their pattern of missing payments and therefore you are not prepared to book any further delays.

If you are happy to do that then I would suggest that at the expiry of that 14 days letter before action – which would be two or three days after the missed payment date, that you issue the papers.

Then do the same thing for every further payment date. It's a bit of a hassle – but they will give up before you do.

[workaholic duck]

Thank you, BF, I'll happily do that. So, if payments are to be made on 18th (see below), I send letter around 7th/8th?

I've just gone to their last email (promising me the world!!) and dammit, Liam promised payments on the 18th of the month. I'll wait this month and send the letter on 18th if unpaid. If you are reading this Future Cons, take note!

This is confusing because I was told earlier that payments used to be made between 15-18th month but they had changed them to 1st month to coincide with most people's phone bills???!

Anyway, I now have the letter ready and waiting. So deflated!

Should I sit on the final response letter from O2 before the ombudsman? Valid for a year. I know they are inundated and it takes forever but it would set a precedent.

[BankFodder]

I suppose so. You have to work it out. How many times have they missed a deadline? At some point I think that it warrants more aggressive action then might be reasonable if it is simply a one off missed payment.

I think you also need to make sure that you have got lots of screenshots all over the Internet of people complaining about exactly this thing so that if it did go to court then you have evidence to show that this is pretty well their business model.

[workaholic duck]

Thanks, BF. I have 50+ screenshots filed! Also, phone transcripts, emails etc. safely stored together, ready and waiting.

Ombudsman and O2?

[BankFodder]

Where are we with this?

 

I have to say that we had three contacts on the Facebook group - only one person bothered to come here and post their story.

 

No wonder that Future Comms gets away with it.

[workaholic duck]

Exactly! What I have learned is that FC like to play childish games. Make false promises, pretend to be your 'friend'......and most, it seems, falls for it.....until the next time!

 

Tbf, though, they target small businesses, who are incredibly busy trying to make a living. I can't fathom it any other way.

 

I have my hands tied, waiting for 18th to see if they pay up. If not, I have my letter ready and waiting.

[BankFodder]

Well luckily in the other Future comms story which has been posted up in the past couple of days

 the Cagger there is not a business but rather a personal customer. This will give him and additional advantage.

I really don't understand why more people aren't coming to take their own actions. Instead I find them complaining on Facebook, complaining on trust pilot, complaining on Google – but never doing anything about it.

Unfortunately although I'm sure that you and also Cagger Louie2015 will get your money pretty quickly once the papers are issued – and maybe even when the threat has been made, this will be small individual actions. What it really takes is a decent number of people to be taking the same action at the same time. This will have an impact and this is the kind of pressure that might force Future comms to change their business model.

If you have any influence around the Internet with others who have had exactly the same problems with Future comms then you should do whatever you can to bring them along here for help. However as I think I've indicated – it might be better not to alert Future comms until you have issued the papers. This would mean that if you can persuade other people to come here, it has to be done fairly stealthily.

It will take quite a number of people to disrupt their business model

[BankFodder]

Well tomorrow is the 18th. How much money will they owe you when they haven't paid you tomorrow? Also, have you seen my suggestion here 

to send them a recurring letter of claim.

Although this is unconventional – the M.O. of Future Comms is pretty unconventional in that they seem to chance their arm every payment date and so I think that in the circumstances it would be very reasonable simply to send them one letter of claim that announces to them that if they don't pay within 14 days he will see them and they ought to consider that this is a letter of claim in respect of every exceeded deadline in the future given their reputation and their apparent business. Make it clear to them that this means that every payment date which is exceeded by a single day will mean that you will issue the court papers without any further delay and without any further notice to them.

Tell them also that if they have a problem with this use of the pre-action protocol that they should then raise it before the judge in court that you will be very pleased to show the court extensive Internet records and testimony from other Future Comms clients that this is the way that Future Comms does things and that you have no other choice – and they have been properly forewarned.

This will avoid you having to suffer a 14 day delay every missed payment date which of course simply brings a little more comfort to Future Comms

How does that sound?

[workaholic duck]

 

Yes, tomorrow is the 18th! Here's extracts from 2 separate emails from different staff:-

 

<….."As discuss yesterday I am emailing you instead of giving you a call. I have calculated all the money owed to yourself, £156.68 as payment to your previous provider and backdated discount of £36. I have also had a months free line rental authorised as a goodwill gesture for the issues you have been having. I have be able to get the backdated discount and the months free line rental authorised for payment on Friday 01/02/19 and the buyout has been scheduled for payment in March 2019. I hope this is satisfactory for yourself and if you have any more concerns or queries please don’t hesitate to contact us".>

 

and:-

 

<…."So I have spoken to my manager and I have set the standing order of your discount on the 18^th of every month. I have recified the discount to £24.60 so your bill would be £15 incuding vat after cash back. This is confirmed to be paid then for you". >

 

Empty promises? Probably as they just seem to say what they think I want to hear. The first 'promise' to pay back-dated £36 didn't happen which forced me to contact O2 again. O2 put pressure on FC to pay, which they did 10 days later. Then O2 sent me a final response letter citing 'deadlock' as their powers were exhausted. 

 

The 2nd email, from another 'manager' (with a 'manager' himself??) states they are willing to pay the full VAT on top of the £18 already promised, taking the monthly pay-back to £24.60. I didn't ask for the full VAT, only the proportion allocated to their payment but I'll accept it anyway. Tomorrow, if still unpaid I will be owed £24.60 + £156.68. Although the latter figure is due 'in March' by the 14 days notice it will be overdue.

 

I definitely do like your idea. It will emphasise my determination to bring them in line and that I will not tolerate any more nonsense from them. I've read, briefly, the links you sent. I will read again later today when I have more time. The addition in the letter of action to be seen as a letter of claim for every missed payment in the future will supersede the earlier suggestion of bringing each subsequent letter of action earlier than the due date. I'll amend my prepared letter accordingly.  I am fully justified after all the trouble they've caused. 

 

 

[BankFodder]

Good. I haven't quite understood how much they will owe you by close of business tomorrow.

[workaholic duck]

£24.60 is what they promised each month after the non-payment (or late payment) of 2 x £18 = £36. (2nd letter)

 

The confirmation of the early termination fee of £156.68, a vague 'in March' promise. (1st letter)

 

So, tomorrow, is £24.60. End of March another £156.68. If I give them 14 days notice tomorrow, then it's the total of the 2 I'll be claiming.

 

Sorry, I have a tendency to waffle (too much detail/explanation?) in order to make everything clear! Maybe it becomes confusing??!

[BankFodder]

Yes, you do tend to confuse things ever so slightly 

In case this is not what you have already decided to do, I suggest that you send a letter of claim telling them that on 1 April – and tell them it's no joke – you will sue them for the £24.60 p, the hundred and £56.68 p and also they should consider that this is a recurring letter of claim with a continuing expiry date of the first of each month if the money has not been paid into your account by the last day of each month as per the contract.

Tell them that you are taking this view of the pre-action protocol because of their history of delayed payments with you and also because it is clear from your Internet research that this is their business model.

Tell them that you will be pleased to show all of the evidence of this to the court at the inevitable hearing.

The absolutely resolute about this. Don't accept even a days delay. Having said that, I see that 1 April falls on a Monday so I suppose that you will end up giving them until the Tuesday.

I'm very disappointed in the other people who initially came to us on the Facebook page and who have even post on this forum about their problems with Future comms. They seem to pretty well have disappeared or they haven't even bothered to come here at all. This is why Future comms gets away with it.

Maybe once Future comms received your letter and responds with a payment then the message will spread around and people start becoming a bit more assertive.

By the way, although I fully expect Future comms to respond with a payment, I can imagine that maybe there were payment won't be complete. Make it clear in your letter to them that the payment must be complete because you will see for whatever outstanding balance there might be.

I suggest that you log onto the money claim website, start preparing your claim. Post here the draft of what you intend to use as your particulars of claim and we will help you refine it.

It really won't need to be very long at all.

[workaholic duck]

Yes, that's pretty much what I read from your initial reply and I intend to do exactly that.

 

I try to stay calm and focused, anger never achieves anything. So, it's clear the steps I will take.

 

As for the others? I have no answer. But, remember it was the same with the banks/financial insts. all those years ago? Financial crash time. Once the government put their back behind PPI, everyone was happy. I was a teeny bit resentful I'd done all the hard work before, together with CAG!! I did take one to small claims and won, so I'll just refresh my memory. (they didn't even bother to attend).

[Reedy17]

I am following this conversation I don't see any purpose of submitting a separate one. Most people are in the very same situation however some have more grounds where phones are missing, services that were never been provided etc etc
I have a SIM only and I do receive the service from O2 which is what it is and has nothing to fault
only problem that there is no cash refund.
I am due to receive the current month but will see tomorrow I guess, I notified them again based on this advice and letter goes out for the backdated and if not received the current month.
I contacted via phone other people who sought legal advice, not too promising re breaking the contract

[workaholic duck]

Sounds same as mine. It's more the principle. I agree, others are in a much worse situation and much more money at stake, never mind their businesses.....

 

As for the contracts, FC do seem to have covered themselves tightly. We looked at all aspects and found very little to prove breach of contract. Except, of course, the continuing 'non payments'. They like to play games to wear you down and hope you'll lose determination. I think they succeed here with many customers!

 

My thinking, so far, is to counter every misdemeanour and refuse to change the contract in ANY way when the 12 month review comes up. Then the same with the 24 month one. ANY CHANGES whatsoever will bind you into another 36 month contract!!!....and on and on to perpetuity! Of course, I fear they will withdraw the payback (since it's only for 12 months in writing) but O2 confirmed it shouldn't happen.

[BankFodder]

13 minutes ago, Reedy17 said:

I am following this conversation I don't see any purpose of submitting a separate one. Most people are in the very same situation however some have more grounds where phones are missing, services that were never been provided etc etc
I have a SIM only and I do receive the service from O2 which is what it is and has nothing to fault
only problem that there is no cash refund.
I am due to receive the current month but will see tomorrow I guess, I notified them again based on this advice and letter goes out for the backdated and if not received the current month.
I contacted via phone other people who sought legal advice, not too promising re breaking the contract

hi, you may think that there is no particular purpose in submitting a separate conversation – but that is not at all the case.

There are a number of extremely good reasons.

Firstly, the more people here posting their separate stories about the same problem, the more likely it is to produce a momentum so that instead of the problems of a particular individual being solved, a more general solution might occur affecting a number of other people and even eventually the business model of Future comms might change.

Secondly, – and once again it's about momentum – Google is far more likely to reference the discussions on this website referring to Future comms if there are lots of discussions and lots of references and people seem to be coming here from a variety of places in order to solve the problems. This is the way Google operates to arrange it's ranking.

At the moment if you search on Future comms, you will tend to find that Future comms takes up pretty well the entire first page of any Google search. This is because Future comms – like so many other companies, are able invest in SEO – Search Engine Optimisation in order to make sure that their businesses occupy as many places as possible and high up in the hierarchy of search results.

We don't have the luxury of this kind of investment so we have to rely on probably a more honest route – which is getting more people with similar interests to gather here to post their stories. When people hang back and think that it's probably not necessary to do anything then Google doesn't take much notice and companies such as Future comms benefit because they don't come in the limelight.

Thirdly, – although it's very much linked to the others, if people see others on this form all discussing the same problem then some of them who are maybe more reluctant to take action will feel encouraged and motivated to take action and so they will produce solutions for themselves but once again they will produce a momentum which might eventually force Future comms to change their way of doing things – or even produce a weight of opinion which might more likely come to the attention of the authorities. You've already seen that the authorities take very little notice. O2 simply seeing it as an annoyance – but that's only because they tend to be contacted by a rather ad hoc mishmash. If these people start realising that they have to apply some economic resources to deal with a number of complaints coming to them then they are more likely to take action and put their own pressure on future comms.

If you still want to sit it out in the shadows then that's fine. But it would be more useful for everyone – including for yourself if you took an active part.

[Reedy17]

I am not sitting in the shadows at all... people are connecting through the TrustPilot reviews and encourage others to contact them and I am actively posting there I get reported by FC all the time for the truth

[BankFodder]

Yes, but look what good trust pilot is doing anybody. Trust pilot simply gives an impression to people that they are doing something when in fact they're not. All it does is it dissipates anger – and Facebook is nearly the same.

If people want to get something done then they have to come here. If all the people on trust pilot came here and issued letters before action in the way that I've described and if those letters before action were acted upon, the future comms problem will be sorted out within a month. As it is, it's been going on for years – and everybody gathers around trust pilot and think they are doing something.

It's really up to you – but I'm afraid that by not getting actively involved, you're not maximising the opportunity to sort this out.