BT Ireland, Debt Collectors Etc.

I was a customer of BT (ESAT at the time) broadband many years ago and as far as I am aware there was never a problem with my account - I filled out a direct debit form, sent it back, used the service for a period then cancelled both it and my direct debit. This was way back in 2004.

Last October I came home from work and there was a Final Demand letter from BT waiting for me, looking for ~600 euro. I rang them about it and was told that there was some kind of mistake and that a credit would be applied to the account to clear the balance and not to worry about it. So I didn't and then a few weeks later I received a letter from a debt collection agency (based in Scotland!) working on BT's behalf. I rang them, told them I was disputing the debt and then rang BT. After explaining the situation to the BT customer care agent again I was told the same thing as I had been told originally: I don't owe any money, there's some kind of mistake, a credit would be applied to account and I won't hear any more about it.

Every two to three weeks for the next few months (i.e., up until April of this year) I received a letter from the same debt collection agency working on BT's behalf. Every time I rang BT and every bloody time they told me that there was some kind of mistake and that everything would be sorted. Sometimes the amount that BT was looking for was €600, sometimes it was around 1200 and on one occasion it was €1900!

Eventually, in April, I finally lost it and demanded that they resolve the problem, telling them that I didn't want to receive any more correspondence about this matter from them or anyone acting on their behalf. I was assured by the customer care agent in question that the situation would be resolved and sure enough I received a phone call the next day to say that a credit had been applied to the account clearing the debt and that the matter was now resolved. I asked for this in writing but was told that BT don't normally send letters about this kind of thing; being something of an optimised I left it at that, believing that the situation was, in fact, resolved and that I wouldn't be hassled by BT again.

Then yesterday I arrived home from work and there was a letter from Stubbs Gazette acting on behalf of BT, who are looking to recover €1200 from me. So I rang BT again, explained the situation again and demanded to speak to a manager (I was very specific about not speaking to a team leader or a supervisor). It being after 6pm, there was no manager available. The girl that I was speaking to went of for a few minutes to do some investigating and when she came back she told me that I did in fact owe this money and that a credit wouldn't be applied to the account to clear it and that no one in BT would do that for me because they can't even though I had been told on numerous occasions that it would be done and that it had been done.

At this point I'm at a loss what to do. I'm supposed to be speaking to a manager today but if the new party line is that they can't or won't clear the debt then I don't know what good it's going to do me. I'm very concerned that this has been referred to Stubbs Gazette (who don't seem to have a facility for notifying them that the account is disputed) and more concerning still is the fact that the girl in BT told me that once something is sent to a debt collection agency, they can't call it back (which sounds like bull**** to me, since I have been told in the past that the debt would be recalled from from the previous debt collection agency that they were using).

Does anyone have any advice about how to proceed with this?

Have you statements from your bank account and billed statements from them and can you get copies of same to prove you dont owe this money. Just on a note regarding calls to BT having worked for the company make sure you speak to either a senior manager there and make sure you get the name of every agent you speak to, they are obliged by company policy to provide this to you.

I'm no longer a customer of the bank that the DD would have been paid out of and I no longer have any statements from that period either, unfortunately. Surely if there was a problem with the DD I would have been notified either by ESAT/BT or by my bank?

A very similar thing happened to me however with 3 broadband. Ask to raise the issue as a complaint within BT and tell them you are doing this as you will be referring your complaint to the Communications Ombudsman, Comreg, this will hopefully scare them into action once they know you mean business (worked for me with 3). [broken link removed].
If however it doesn't do contact Comreg, do this after exhausting the complaints procedure within BT, as it the requirment before contacting Comreg.

I hope this helps and best of luck.

BT's billing operations are notoriously incompetent; I had a similarly Kafkaesque experience with them some years ago and a quick search on the likes of Boards.ie will reveal how widespread the problem is. I'd suggest at this stage that:

(a) you don't bother talking to customer service agents any more; deal only with a senior manager (get a direct line for them and an individual email address).

(b) you initiate a formal written complaint now, with a view to pursuing it with Comreg once a month has elapsed, and copy Stubbs Gazette on it. Be sure to provide full details.

(c) you emphasise in your complaint how stressful/time-consuming the experience has been for you, and indicate that if it is not resolved satisfactorily (and permanently) within a reasonable period you will have no alternative but to refer the matter to your legal advisors. I'd suggest adding now that if you are required to pay for duplicate bank statements from 2004 and a credit check at the end of the process, BT should reimburse those costs to you.

Best of luck.

Make sure you record all telephone conversations you have with them.

Next time you ring up, go through a synopsis of the events with whoever you are speaking to so that all the important points are captured on the next recorded telephone conversation.

You are under no obligation to inform BT that you are recording the telephone conversation - it is perfectly legal to record your own telephone conversations provided the recording equipment does not damage eircoms lines.

All good advice - thanks.

If your in Dublin, you would be better off arriving into the offices and speaking to them person. It is too easy for them to hide behind a phone.

Towger said:

If your in Dublin, you would be better off arriving into the offices and speaking to them person. It is too easy for them to hide behind a phone.

Click to expand...

I agree. Turn up at their head office. Make a scene if you have to.

I wouldn't have accepted the "we don't normally send letters" excuse you got from customer services. I think I'd have asked if it was normal that such a dog's dinner is made of customer accounts.

I'd have told them that unless I got the letter, I was contacting Comreg. But hindsight is 20/20. At this stage, I think I'd contact Comreg straight away. BT have called in the big guns, why shouldn't you?

Also, there was a suggestion earlier to start a paper trail of correspondence. Anything you send, send it by registered post or courier.

Good luck with this. It makes my blood boil how these companies think they can bully us like this. If you do succeed, I doubt you'll even get an apology. It's disgraceful...

My wife and I had a similar problem to yours with BT, they are an absolute nightmare to deal with. The only way we got our problem resolved was to refuse to talk to them over the phone as telephone conversations are hearsay, instead start writing to them. If they ring refuse to talk to them and ask for them correspond with you in writing. First ask where has this amount has come from, and why are you only getting this bill now. Also try to dig up old bills even if you still have them, to locate your final bill from them. We had so many different stories from their customer service team, manager on a break, we don't deal with letters, absolute rubbish. I hope your letter correspondence resolves as it did with us. But I would never do business with them again.

On a sub note while DD is handy if I was to change a service provider for my home I would go back to paying the bill manually as its leave you in control.

I have said many times on AAM that I will not set up a DD due to past problems. I am a BT customer and do not pay by DD, they email when the payment is due and I either pay on-line or over the phone. With ESB I use open 24. It is in their own interest to take control of your payments. My son was paying DD for many months after stopping a service (he should have check his bank statements). He has lost this money.
I have refused electric supplies from Airtricity and Bord Gais because they insist on DD only, even though I could save money by changing. If we all refused DD it would be in our interest instead, and they would soon stop insisting on DD.

So I emailed a senior staff member in BT and finally made some headway. It appears that two things have happened. Firstly, my bill was only paid once (not sure how this happened since I filled out a direct debit form). Secondly I was billed *after* my service was cancelled. The latter issue was rectified but the former wasn't and it is this sum that I am now being pursued for. Obviously I will try to corroborate this with the bank in question (I'm no longer a customer of theirs so this should be fun).

I'm not sure where I should go from here; assuming that the bank backs up BT's take on events I may have to just pay up but I'm not particularly happy given the sum involved. I also wonder if it's worth pointing out to them that they didn't uphold part of their end of the contract by failing to bill me properly?

Is it likely that I could get them to agree to let me pay in installments if I do agree to pay back the debt?

Do you have any contact details for the senior staff you mentioned? I cancelled my account with them but they continued to bill me for over 12 months (stupid of me not to check my statements but I have had a lot of activity on them due to paying a lot of bills related to my house build and hadn't noticed this one appearing every couple of months)
They took over €900 from me before i got them to stop and they then refused to repay as they say they gave me the service even though I was no longer in the location the service was offered to.
This experience has left an extremely bitter taste in my mouth and it will certainly impact any telco choices I make in the future for myself or my employer... I cannot believe the way they treated me and can see why they are moving out of the consumer retail business - with their customer service I'm surprised they have any customers!!