Bad Debt Notification from UPC

CFC1969

My mother received a bad debt notification from UPC yesterday for 75.37 EUR.

The story is:

She had the basic package (150 EUR per 6 Months), so I hooked up a freesat system in March, and when she received the 6 monthly bill from UPC, I rang them up and asked them to cancel her connection.


In mid april , she received a letter stating they would degrade her service, and one week later cut it off, to reconnect would cost 10 EUR
I ignored this letter, thinking it was procedure.

They eventually cut off her UPC in Late May, this was no problem as she was on freesat since early march.

She has now received a letter from UPC stating legal dept.will issue proceedings, and her credit rating will be affected.

Credit rating is not important, she is 85 and has no credit cards, loans etc ....

Can you advise, as I want to get this sorted, and will not pay for a service I cancelled and was not using.

Pacing Mule

CFC1969 wrote: »

My mother received a bad debt notification from UPC yesterday for 75.37 EUR.

The story is:

She had the basic package (150 EUR per 6 Months), so I hooked up a freesat system in March, and when she received the 6 monthly bill from UPC, I rang them up and asked them to cancel her connection.


In mid april , she received a letter stating they would degrade her service, and one week later cut it off, to reconnect would cost 10 EUR
I ignored this letter, thinking it was procedure.

They eventually cut off her UPC in Late May, this was no problem as she was on freesat since early march.

She has now received a letter from UPC stating legal dept.will issue proceedings, and her credit rating will be affected.

Credit rating is not important, she is 85 and has no credit cards, loans etc ....

Can you advise, as I want to get this sorted, and will not pay for a service I cancelled and was not using.

Reply to them in writing detailing your cancellation request. Credit rating cannot be effected by UPC at all so don't be too worried about that. Only accredited financial institutions like banks and credit card issuers can do this. You are likely to receive letters and phone calls etc from debt collection agencies so it's in your best interests to contact them and explain your version as such.

Cabaal

CFC1969 wrote: »

Can you advise, as I want to get this sorted, and will not pay for a service I cancelled and was not using.

Unless your a named contact on your mothers UPC account there is no way you could have requested the account to be cancelled.

Were you a named contact on your mothers account?

foggy_lad

but if UPC accepted any cancellation request should they have acted on it or at least try to contact the account holder?

this is just their way of screwing even more money out of people op and they are not the only company that "messes up" cancellation or disconnection requests. they are relying on the majority of people just paying instead of going through months of being ignored by their customer care on the phone.

CFC1969

Cabaal wrote: »

Unless your a named contact on your mothers UPC account there is no way you could have requested the account to be cancelled.

Were you a named contact on your mothers account?

Cabaal,


The account is to Mrs (My Fathers Name) , My name is the same and I explained to girl that my mother was old and I was doing this on her behalf, was not informed this was an issue.

JDxtra

I think some additional facts would help us here.

Was she within a 12 months contract that you attempted to terminate early? There is also a notice period (usually 30 days) when cancelling. Did you initiate the cancellation after a bill was issued and due to be paid?

It seems unusual that the package was downgraded before being terminated. Downgraded to what exactly if she only had the basic pack? Was there broadband or another service added to the account? If there was then there may be a cancellation fee included.

It will be worth checking what the final bill is actually for. You can access it online if you don't have a physical copy. That will help explain the costs are.

CFC1969

JDXtra,

Her package was old one, no bundled package.

It was bog standard telly package ... Setanta Ireland, Sky one , Living etc .... package has not been changed for 20 years .


When I say degraded, I assume they meant cable degradation, make quality fuzzy .

Bills were pretty simple, they are 6 month into the future and cost 147.50 EUR. These bills are posted every 6 months

JDxtra

There may have been some confusion on the part of UPC - so it's definitely worth checking the final bill and following it up with them.

I know I registered my parents on the UPC site so we could view and compare previous bills. It was fairly straight forward.

Best of luck.

Cabaal

CFC1969 wrote: »

Cabaal,


The account is to Mrs (My Fathers Name) , My name is the same and I explained to girl that my mother was old and I was doing this on her behalf, was not informed this was an issue.

Doesn't matter, if UPC change anything on the account then they are in breach of the data protection act.

Had you provided UPC with a signed authorization allowing you to act on her behalf then that's fine but until this happens it doesn't matter what you say...UPC don't have to change anything on the account legally.

You may not like it but the data protection act exists for a very good reason and its there to protect people's data.