I switched to Bord Gais and agreed to pay by Direct Debit - purely for the reduction in rate. It is the only Direct Debit that I have. However I circumvent the Direct Debit every two months by paying through my bank's online system as soon as the bill comes and immediately contacting Bord Gais to inform them of this and not to present the Direct Debit for payment for that bill as it has already been paid. So far so good. I do stress that I have to make contact with Bord Gais immediately when I get the bill as to delay even by a couple of days could mean that the direct debit has been sent to the bank for processing.
I have what most people consider a direct debit against my credit card for a telephone/broadband bill. This is technically called a Regular Payment and there seems to be no rules or regulations regarding it's implementation, as opposed to Direct Debits. So far, so good in that also. I keep an eagle eye on every bill, statement, invoice, receipt - everything and it amazes me how many mistakes I find - and how long it can take to have them rectified. I also keep the same eagle eye on some friends' accounts. One case still going on is a friend of mine who, on my advice, switched his telephone/broadband account from Imagine to Perlico, in August. What should have been his final bill arrived in September with 4 daft charges on it. I contated the company and explained, in detail what was wrong. I contacted them by both phone and email. It was agreed that the charges were wrong and I was instructed that that bill should be ingored and all would be rectified by the following bill - which it wasn't. The 'bill' arrived in October with two of the erroneous charges rectified, but not the other two. Again I made contact, both by phone and email pointing out the errors and again was told that I was correct, and to ignore the bill and all would be corrected in the following bill in November. In the meantime two letters demanding payment for overdue amounts arrived, despite being instructed to ignore the bills. November's 'bill' (for an account ended in August!), and though it had a credit on it, it was not for the correct amount and when I contacted Imagine regarding this, they could not explain where this figure came from or what it represented. They yet again agreed with my figures, which, incidentally means that they actually owe a few euro back to my friend since August, are correct, they said yet again, to ignore the bill, and yet again that all would be rectified in the next bill - December's!
So be warned, anyone who reads this, and please tell as many as you can, please check your bills, line by line and don't just look at the bottom line.
I don't mean to single out Imagine for undue criticism as I have found that there are an incredible amount of billing errors with different companies. I've also found that they can be addressed and rectified, but it can take huge amounts of time and patience, and organisation. Whenever I make a contact, or they do - I make note of the date, time, their name, what department they work in and the details of the conversation. I find that it is very useful and indeed essential to do this. I try hard to treat kindly the Customer Service Agents as they have very very limited scope in what they are allowed to do, and mostly it involves one of two things - getting their supervisor or sending an email to another department.
I know I've rambled a bit off the point here and ask your indulgence for that.
Please, be diligent in watching your bills, and organised in how you attempt to deal with the errors that you will inevitably spot.