Cant Get an UpgradevBecause Im not Direct Debit

[grabbi]

Once again, the non-Direct Debit customers are screwed over.

I just called up, paid my bill and asked for an upgrade to VIP from 2Mb through STB.

Now they put BB on a separate bill (even though the whole point of having services with one company is to have it all on one bill) and demand we pay via Direct Debit for BB. The TV and Phone line can continue to be paid anyway we like.

Bull. Absolute bull.

Now, wanting an upgrade, and as seen as I pay £76p/m already, isn't as easy as I'd have thought.

im on VIP pack without DD

[mondeo]

Same here. I have VIP and no DD, so I would call them back

[grabbi]

Really?! I'm fuming!!!!!!

My bill has not been right in 2 years who in there right mind would set up a DD when its always over

[mondeo]

Exactly the same reason why I have never set up a DD. In the 4-5 years I've been with Telewest/Virgin, they have got maybe 1 or 2 bills right. I got bills for 2 phone lines and 2 BB packages for nearly 18 months. And when I upgraded to VIP my first months bill came to nearly £400. It was actually only £93, so I can see how easy it was for them to make such a small mistake

[grabbi]

Agreed.

Well, after a phonecall, a cut off and another phone call, I've got my free modem on its way by friday.

I've to call up then for an upgrade.

[Marge]

Grabbi, the billing system you are on works differently dependant on where you live. As an ex C&W customer your BB when suppled via a modem, has just one account that bills and has the modem attached to it. For the likes of Zingle, they have one account that bills and one that has the modem on. Confusing eh ??

When setting an account up for ex C&W customers you have to enter some kind of payment method, either Continous CC or DD. It won't let you go further until you've entered one or the other.

Once everything has been sorted out and everyone is billed the same then it will stop things like this happening. It's so frustrating for staff not to be able to provide the same service across the board.

So its not really the DD issue that's the problem, it's where you live !!!

[popper]

marge, any idea why they dont let you have more than one CM?,
1 SACM and a STB-CM for instance thats already pluged in and powered in most users homes..., is that also the exC&W billing stopping them making profits from already powered and pluged CM's ?.

will that change after this change you speak of i wonder, i wanted exactly this for the lads machine but i cant have it....

[slowcoach]

Almost 3 years with The Firm with everything on DD and never once a problem, works well for me.

[grabbi]

I'm not setting up a DD to be stuck with no money when they do cock up.

So what will happen now then?

I've been posted my Cable Modem to set up myself, which will be here on friday, so if I phone them, will they give me the 10Mb BB or not?

[xpod]

When we first signed up over year ago now we were quite happy to set up the dd but within a week we had cause to change banks and after calling up NTL to switch accounts the change of details went through without a problem....or so we thought.

When the bill was actually due NTL still tried to take the £££ from the cancelled account which resulted in the dreaded £35 charge.To add insult to injury, because that first bill was for a month and a part the bill automatically went over the initial £100 credit limit just a couple of days after NTL failed to get their cash which then resulted in our services suddenly going off.

THATS when we found out about the cock up was when the services all went off,no phonecall from NTL during the days since they`d failed to collect paymet but boy did they get one from me now.The first of many sadly.
We were put back on immediately with apologies all round as well as getting an eventual refund on the £35,although i had to chase up evidence to get that back.

I ended up paying that first bill over the phone and just asking if i could pay like that in future."This was`nt a problem" i was told but no-one ever mentioned the £5 charge to me at the time.I had to discover that myself the next time we had "bill problems".
Your not entirely safe paying over the phone either as we once had the nice indian lady take 2x the £100++ bill,which again we had to discover for ourselves some days later.

When we first upgraded to the 4Mb broadband though again i was told i`d need to use direct debit so here i am now probably the only daft git who pays for his bb by dd but still gets charged a fiver for paying my tv\phone bill over the phone.
I get enough freebies to well & truly cancel it out i suppose but i`ve also earned those freebies with the s**t we`ve put up with over the year.

1 SACM and a STB-CM for instance thats already pluged in and powered in most users homes..., is that also the exC&W billing stopping them making profits from already powered and pluged CM's ?.

will that change after this change you speak of i wonder, i wanted exactly this for the lads machine but i cant have it....

Thats what i have myself...the 10Mb sacm connection between mine & my daughters machines and the 1Mb stb connection up to my lads pc.(keeps him off the 10?Mb connection and having me & the girls on 2Mb all the time)
It was one of the freebies that kept me here at the time in fact.