Magnet terminate service and now demand to be paid for remainder of contract

etcetc

taught i had got over the frustration and anger of this but now they land a solicitors letter demanding payment or else

anyways heres the story what would you do?

last year i moved in with father in law while waiting for sale of our house to complete

he had no broadband and as i run business from home i needed it. so i took over the bill and switched phone line to magnet and got their best broadband package , needless to say i had to downgrade this as despite their sales guys utterances the eircom line was only capable of 5.1 speed.

was happy enough with service and direct debits paid on time etc.a couple of months turned into 9/10 months before we were in position to move

i rang magnet to see what story was with bill and would they be sticky on their contract and see how long was left on contract was told contract had to be paid up but they offered to switch it to new address but at this stage we had no new address as we were still looking at rentals so i left it at that and i did not commit myself to anything as basically i didnt mind paying bill till contract ended as i needed phone for continuity for business. direct debit was still in place

we went away on holidays for a week and when we get back to father in laws house he tells us phone not working sure enough it wasnt. loads of phone calls to magnet and no answeres. they were checking with eircom for fault blah blah not their responsibility no immediate business support there.

almost a week later following up the issue they finally admit that the line had been terminated by their good selfs as i hadnt rang them back with new address and now it would take at least 3 weeks to get line reconnected by eircom

they really didnt give a hoot about my business and loss of business in the meantime

in one of many heated discussions at this stage i queried whether they were going to compensate me and they only thing they could say was that a stop was put on my account. Once that phone call finished i put a permanent stop to the account and cancelled direct debit and called UPC and got appopintment for broadband/telephone install the next day.

throughout this whole debacle the sales guy who made the call to terminate their services and whom i spoke with when discussing my options was always away from desk and never returned any calls which they promised he would

their technical dept did ring a day or two later to see if they had to contact eircom to get line back up i told them i couldnt afford to wait any longer they had terminated the line without my permission and that i had enough and i was changing service provider at the expense of my father in law losing his telephone number and me having to get business cards and invoices etc reprinted with new contact number.

the next week we actually moved out of father in laws house.

Every statement that came there after looking for payment was quickly followed up by a phone call from myself clearly telling them i wasnt paying them this was their fault i never asked them to cut off the service. Again each time they were told i never intended not paying out remainder of contract as it was father in laws phone and he would probably of taking over the contract anyways and i would of still had use of the service

now it seems they are going the ESB route of debt collection, so i ring the debt collector guy this morning and inform him exactly what i said above. the guy is politely not interested and can only deal with taking a payment and suggests ringing magnet i told him i have rang them loads of times and sometimes they just hung up on me when i wasnt agreeing with their interpretation of events

anyways what would you guys do

i know i should of got my solicitor on to it immediately but thats just more money but at this stage i would rather give a solicitor 100/200/300 euros to go after them for damages/loss of business/stress than pay them the 170 euros they want

Magnet: Rory

etcetc wrote: »

taught i had got over the frustration and anger of this but now they land a solicitors letter demanding payment or else

anyways heres the story what would you do?

last year i moved in with father in law while waiting for sale of our house to complete

he had no broadband and as i run business from home i needed it. so i took over the bill and switched phone line to magnet and got their best broadband package , needless to say i had to downgrade this as despite their sales guys utterances the eircom line was only capable of 5.1 speed.

was happy enough with service and direct debits paid on time etc.a couple of months turned into 9/10 months before we were in position to move

i rang magnet to see what story was with bill and would they be sticky on their contract and see how long was left on contract was told contract had to be paid up but they offered to switch it to new address but at this stage we had no new address as we were still looking at rentals so i left it at that and i did not commit myself to anything as basically i didnt mind paying bill till contract ended as i needed phone for continuity for business. direct debit was still in place

we went away on holidays for a week and when we get back to father in laws house he tells us phone not working sure enough it wasnt. loads of phone calls to magnet and no answeres. they were checking with eircom for fault blah blah not their responsibility no immediate business support there.

almost a week later following up the issue they finally admit that the line had been terminated by their good selfs as i hadnt rang them back with new address and now it would take at least 3 weeks to get line reconnected by eircom

they really didnt give a hoot about my business and loss of business in the meantime

in one of many heated discussions at this stage i queried whether they were going to compensate me and they only thing they could say was that a stop was put on my account. Once that phone call finished i put a permanent stop to the account and cancelled direct debit and called UPC and got appopintment for broadband/telephone install the next day.

throughout this whole debacle the sales guy who made the call to terminate their services and whom i spoke with when discussing my options was always away from desk and never returned any calls which they promised he would

their technical dept did ring a day or two later to see if they had to contact eircom to get line back up i told them i couldnt afford to wait any longer they had terminated the line without my permission and that i had enough and i was changing service provider at the expense of my father in law losing his telephone number and me having to get business cards and invoices etc reprinted with new contact number.

the next week we actually moved out of father in laws house.

Every statement that came there after looking for payment was quickly followed up by a phone call from myself clearly telling them i wasnt paying them this was their fault i never asked them to cut off the service. Again each time they were told i never intended not paying out remainder of contract as it was father in laws phone and he would probably of taking over the contract anyways and i would of still had use of the service

now it seems they are going the ESB route of debt collection, so i ring the debt collector guy this morning and inform him exactly what i said above. the guy is politely not interested and can only deal with taking a payment and suggests ringing magnet i told him i have rang them loads of times and sometimes they just hung up on me when i wasnt agreeing with their interpretation of events

anyways what would you guys do

i know i should of got my solicitor on to it immediately but thats just more money but at this stage i would rather give a solicitor 100/200/300 euros to go after them for damages/loss of business/stress than pay them the 170 euros they want

Can I look into this, perhaps we can resolve the issue. Can you PM me on this?