Tiscali nightmare:-(...can anyone help..at wits end.

[SpaceCadet]

warning..this is long.
as some of you may remember, i moved house on 3rd may, a week before hand, i asked tiscali to carry my phone and broadband service over to my new address and phone number and filled out an online form, no probs.
i got an email confirmation to say that the service at my old address would be cancelled and a new service would begin after 10 working days.
however after 2 weeks i lost my patience, and rang them up saying i didnt want the service as it was taking too long, they said, fine no problem, neither phone nor broadband had been activated at the new address, so it would just be cancelled.
today, i receive a final demand, for tiscali talk, on my new phone number AND my old one, my old line was disconnected on 3rd may, yet they stated that the service was still on the line, also, i had the service on my new line., how could that be when my phone calles had been going through aol since 4th june?? i ring several diff departments, no one wants to know, they all insist that not only did i fail to cancel my service at my old address, but that i apparently rang them and requested the service on my new line.
i said that wasnt true and one man called me a liar., i phoned the collections dept who tell me that i have 7 days to pay or face further action, they imform me that this has been logged with a credit reference agency.
i phone cancellations and say, if this service is still on my line i want it cancelled and they refuse!
so i olwe money for a service i didnt know i had, on 2 phone numbers, and they are going to keep on billing me for it.
i havent stopped crying..i rang offcom and they were as much use as a chocolate teapot.

oh bugger.

well - it sounds like they're using agencies and temps galore, hence the misunderstandings and the rudeness. Probably the old line was cancelled by them late, and that was why they didn't activate the new one. or maybe someone just cocked up entirely.

anyway, put it all in writing and send it registered, obviously keeping a copy. You'll probably get the quickest response if you send it to the complaints dept. don't worry about the credit reference agency for now - you can get that fixed later, and debt collection agencies can't do anything while the debt is in dispute.

in the meantime, I'd do something really useful like go out and buy one of those chocolate teapots.

oh yes, also write to cancellations.

god I hate call centres.

thanks sp..sigh, i cant beleive its happened, the collections agency isin bangladesh which wasnt very helpful.

the trouble is, theyve told me that in their opinion, there is no dispute over the payment and although i said i would write to head office, they would initiate action if i didnt pay in 7 days, but im not paying, its money i dont owe and i will not pay it.

tearful bump.

they can't do that - in dispute is in dispute. bloody ludicrous for them to suggest otherwise. they're just trying to scare you into paying up.

I am 99% sure of that (have had a few similar misbillings with various utilities). you might get 100% sure advice from cab if you need your mind putting at rest.

...ah foreign call centre eh?

I really don't know why companies move them. I don't care what nationality the people answering the phone are, but subcontracted call centres in other countries are never going to be as good as those owned by the company with experienced staff.

hsbc used to have an excellent call centre, but now none of the staff have much experience and none have the discretion the staff in the old centre have so it takes 3 times as long to sort problems if they get sorted at all. I've resorted to sorting everything out in person at my branch when i go back to the UK, so it's costing them money.

cab may have to be my next stopwhat i dont understand is how they can claim that i iniated a service on a phone line that was about to be disconnected..thanks for replying btw.

you have evidence though - you have the email confirming the cancellation. if you forward that to them and also send them a written request to cancel the new one (obviously stating you are only confirming what you said on the phone) they haven't got a leg to stand on.

I have found with the bank that if you write to them or even fax the branch you get actual action because the person answering is a proper employee and not a temp (usually).

it might also make you feel better if you write to watchdog/guardian consumer column/some such thing. I keep meaning to do that but never get round to it, but i did report someone to trading standards the other day. made me feel much better!

im gathering all my evidence, i have a letter too confirming the cancellation, ive just been onto bt too and have told them that tiscali put the service on without my permission, they have removed it for me, bet tiscali still try to bill me for it though!

i told one of the call centre lot that i was reporting them to trading standards!

Was watching one of those consumer rights style programmes - one thing they said was that if you really are having a problem (and it sounds like you are) find out the name of someone high up in the company and send the letter to them - apparently it tends to get sorted out a lot more quickly and better if you do that.

i tried that tactic but so far have drawn a blank as theywont tell me any names, they just gave me head offices address, but no particular name to address it to.

here are some Tiscali names

apparently you can get extension numbers from tiscali call cente employees which tag to individuals

not that it should make a difference to you, but having worked for a telco I can almost guarantee what's happened is that they may have cancelled you on their phone system but probably not on the billing system. You would be amazed that such large companies could have so many different systems that don't talk to each other.

You are doing the right thing - keep all the correspondence - whatever you do, don't send the originals (they will prob lose them!). Also, if they insist your line was connected, ask for a breakdown of calls etc. Even if it was connected, if you have a letter confirming when it should have been cut off, as long as you weren't using the line, there's not much they can do.

It is a total hassle trying to sort this stuff out . The whole stress of just hanging on the line is enough to drive most people mad!

another long phone call..ive been told, they wont remove their service till i pay up..laughable, most companies disconnect you if you wont pay.
finally it dawned on the guy at the end of the phone what may have happened, somehow, as fox says, i stayed on their billing system for both phone lines, he is ringing the finance dept tomorrow to try and resolve it and gave me his ext number and name..i will find out either tomorrow or thursday whats happening..

Hope you sort all this out. I am glad I read your thread because we were thinking of having Tiscali, but you have changed my mind!! Think I will stick with AOL. The great thing about the internet is how many customers can be lost to a company because of one poorly handled incident. They have lost my business and I am sure they will have lost a whole lot more from people who have read this and not posted.

Good luck - I know how difficult it is to fight a faceless organisation and I know all about foreign bloody call centres with robotic people on the end of the line - infuriating.

god we're about to try and change our tiscali for a new address. think i'll look into just paying the BB contract up and stopping all together.

good luck and let us know how u go.

Spacecadet - I've had a similar problem with tiscalli. Last year we moved to a new house and wanted tiscalli broadband - we haddn't had it before. I arranged for it a few days before we moved in and it was scheduled for a couple of weeks time, it wasn't installed on time. At this point I'd received some mail from them about their phone packages, so I asked if when the broadband was installed could we also have phone calls with them too. Weeks went by and no broadband - I had to keep chasing and eventually I told them to forget it. Each time I called I said that I didn't want the phone call s to start until the broadband was installed - this was about September time.

Just before Christmas we received a final demand from them for phone calls - I rang up, got some incredibly rude person, who said I had to pay up to which I refused, I also told them to cancel the service. We heard nothing, then in April we got another bill, so I rang again and again just got general rudeness. A couple of months later I realised that they still hadn't cancelled the service, so I rang BT and asked them to take over our phone calls and rang Tiscalli again. This time I got someone who wasn't rude, but still quite difficult he argued that the telephone service was seperate to broadband and so all my phone calls regarding bb had nothing to do with the phone calls and that I had ordered the service, even though I had asked for it not to be activated untill the broadband. Anyway we went around and around in circles I managed to stay calm and kept explaining my point and did mention offcom. Eventually he agreed to send an internal email (oh by the way he wasn't in a foreign call centre) explaining what had happened and making a case for me not to pay. I haven't heard anything from them and that was a long time ago now, so I think they've gone away.

A couple of points that seemed to hit home with them were A. the fact there was no direct debit set up and B. That when the phone call first started for the first week or so if you want your calls through them you have to dial a prefix, which I never did so they did agree that if I had wanted the calls I would have used the prefix.

I also asked them loads of times to stop the services and they refused, but BT were happy to take it over, so try that.

Hope this helps, I guess I'm saying keep trying to get someone english and stay calm. If I were you I'd just keep calling untill you get someone remotely reasonable.

I know how you feel , its shit.

Just before

Call the head of PR - just ask for them at switchboard and very calmly explain the situation and that you have no choice but to make the matter public and will be contacting Watchdog/local media. I would emphasise any factors like single mum/family to feed/great stress at time of pregnancy etc if you have them (think tabloid headlines "Tiscali accused of stressing out lucious new Mum Spacecadet" says the Star... etc)

Generally this gets a speedy and diplomatic response.

also might be worth trying their PR firm if you can't reach anyone - think its a company called Hotwire, who'll be on the web at www.hotwirepr.com

ta v much for all your responses.
glassofwine what a nightmare for you.
right well, the upshot as of today is that, they have agreed to immediately remove the old account that im still being charged for and refund, 23 pounds which they have charged me, however, they still state that i wanted the service on my new address and never cancelled, apparently, they have been emailing me phone bills..to my old tiscali email addy! its laughable really, anyway, they are still pursueing me for the rest of the dosh, i could pay it tomorrow if i wanted, but why should i??
phoned bt and insisted they remove the carrier pre select off the line that tiscali put on there, then tiscali will have no choice but to close my account down..hopefully, im writing to head office to dispute the final amount.
word of warning to anyone thinking of using tiscali...DONT!