UPC Raising their Prices on 4th Jan Again!!!!

punchdrunk

I got this notice in writing through my door today,saying 30 days to cancel
so I think it's time to look at alternatives...

Infoanon

Infoanon wrote: »

More text messages going out today:

UPC: View a notice about UPC's January price change at www.upc.ie .Sign up to MyUPC & go to My Messages.Prefer a printed copy of the notice ? Please reply YES

Follow up when say YES

Thank you for your request.A copy of the notice will be sent to you by post.COMREG should place a heavy fine on UPC but I doubt that will happen.

Well nearly 2 weeks later and still no sign of the notices - does the 30 days run from date of posting or receipt.....

As for Fines - UPC where fined in the courts on Monday - €17,000 for cold calling customers - breach of data protection act - the Judge had a few things to say about their behaviour and cold calling.

Therefore imagine my surprise today when I got a phone call from UPC telling me about their services..........do they ever learn ??

dub45

Its quite extraordinary that a supposedly reputable multi national company has no respect for the law.

I have an admission in writing from them that they lied to me twice in respect of the Data Protection Act. Firstly they tried to use the Act to tell me that they could not give me information in writing about one of their products.

When I requested a formal search in respect of the phone call in which they made this claim they denied that any such phone call was made.

I pushed it with them and eventually received an admission that the phone call had taken place.

Quite incredible really such disrespect (to put it kindly) for the law of the land.

Infoanon

dub45 wrote: »

Its quite extraordinary that a supposedly reputable multi national company has no respect for the law.

Reading the reports on the Judgement highlights UPC's complete disregard for its consumers.

"Assistant commissioner at the Data Protection Commissioner’s office Tony Delaney told the court regarding UPC calling a customer 225 times over 20 days “Clearly, this is one of the most serious cases, in terms of phone calls, that has ever come before the Data Protection Commission,”.

UPC was also convicted of making unsolicited sales calls to three other subscribers after they had expressly requested not to be contacted for marketing purposes.

Imposing sentence, Judge Bridget Reilly said she was not convinced UPC had been “fully co-operative” with the Data Protection Commission’s attempts to resolve the matter in relation to one of the complainants."

Unfortunately fining them €7k (RTE reported 17?) will have little impact and their actions since the ruling show the contempt they have for the courts and the Data Protection Commission. They (Data Protection Commission) have stated that "consumers should not receive cold calls or spam texts from companies unless they had agreed or had a preference for such contacts recorded on a national register".

stelydave

Hi - I receive about a call a month from UPC trying to sell different products or packages. I never subscribed to/requested to be on any list so wasn't surprised to see them being fined in the courts recently.

It doesn't seem to have stopped them however as I received another call again today! No amount of asking to be removed from their marketing list appears to work.

Anyone else also still receiving these calls after asking to be removed?

Thanks, SD

Infoanon

Infoanon wrote: »

Well nearly 2 weeks later and still no sign of the notices - does the 30 days run from date of posting or receipt.....

Letters have arrived !

UPC have some cheek, starts off with 'As you will be aware,UPC introduced a number of price changes for its services on 4 Jan...For details of all UPC price changes,please go to the 'my messages' section of 'My UPC' ..'

So despite the letter, they still have not told me how much the prove increase is !! thus they are still in breach of their own terms and conditions and banking regulations.

dub45

Infoanon wrote: »

Letters have arrived !

UPC have some cheek, starts off with 'As you will be aware,UPC introduced a number of price changes for its services on 4 Jan...For details of all UPC price changes,please go to the 'my messages' section of 'My UPC' ..'

So despite the letter, they still have not told me how much the prove increase is !! thus they are still in breach of their own terms and conditions and banking regulations.

I dont know about the banking regulations!:) But I am sure it wouldnt worry them too much if they were. You should forward a copy of that letter to Comreg I know that they are interested in finding out how UPC are handling this.

Can I remind people what it says on the Comreg website about this?

UPC has now proposed to ComReg a proactive programme of individual customer communications, covering the relevant customers affected, so as to advise customers of the change and allow them to exercise their rights.

Proactive? Three months later/

And can I remind people again that if UPC only get a euro extra per month from each customer from these price rises they have now managed to get
€2,355,000 so far in 2011 from price increases that are effectively illegal!

Meanwhile it goes on and on!

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/pricewatch/2011/0314/1224292056327.html

Infoanon

dub45 wrote: »

I dont know about the banking regulations!:) But I am sure it wouldnt worry them too much if they were. You should forward a copy of that letter to Comreg I know that they are interested in finding out how UPC are handling this.

Thanks dub45 - banking - if you are on direct debit and an alteration is to be made to the amount then the company (ie UPC) must issue an invoice with the revised amount before the amount is debited against your account - from memory someone posted a link to the relevant legislation on this site.

dub45

Infoanon wrote: »

Thanks dub45 - banking - if you are on direct debit and an alteration is to be made to the amount then the company (ie UPC) must issue an invoice with the revised amount before the amount is debited against your account - from memory someone posted a link to the relevant legislation on this site.

I have not doubt that it was my good self that posted that very link as it is an issue I feel very strongly about. However what you are talking about is the direct debit scheme and not banking regulations.

The status of the direct debit scheme rules is probably questionable really. The banks are supposedly responsible for the scheme and your own bank is supposed to look after your interests in relation to the scheme but more often that not the staff haven't got the faintest notion of how the scheme works even such a basic thing as cancelling a dd causes consternation.

The scheme is administered by IPSO the Irish Payment Services Organisation which is an industry body - there is no consumer input into the scheme whatsoever and the complaints system is a joke - no matter what a company does under the scheme nothing every happens. The only ones ever "punished" under the scheme are of course the general public. (Companies can and do reinstate "cancelled" direct debits with impunity.)

Our good friends in UPC exploit the dd system and are excellent at "punishing" customers who miss their dd payment. Any such person is charged €11 if they do. Are people told about this when they are taking out the dd? In the infamous words....."Are they f**K!"

I have referred this to IPSO as well as various other breaches of the scheme by UPC and IPSO dont give the proverbial f**K about what UPC do.

Now back to our 11 euros. My information from chatting to bank people is that up to 10% of people miss their direct debits every month. Not a surprise in the current climate.

So lets say that UPC have 400,000 customers on dd (could be more, could be less) so if 40,000 customers miss their dd every month UPC could get 440,000 from their charge that they don't tell anyone about and that IPSO the supposed guardians of the scheme know about but do nothing about!!


Now the ESB do a similar thing and charge you €6 euros per missed dd. Again they dont tell you about this upfront. So lets say it takes the full €6 to cover administration charges etc etc that's still leaving UPC with a handy €5 per missed dd. Which could leave them with €200,000 per month for absolutely zilch other than cute hoorism! (And remember the direct debit scheme is supposed to be purely a bill payment system)

How about this quote from the dd scheme rules:

The essence of such an arrangement is that of the total integrity of and trust in the Scheme. All
Participants must work together to ensure that such integrity and trust is maintained.

Where is the integrity in charging people €11 (or €6 in the case of the ESB) when they are not warned about such a charge? Where is the integrity in a scheme that allows them to behave like this?

They are an appalling company exploiting an appalling system.

They really see their customers as subjects whom they can treat with contempt and without any fear of any of the authorities taking action against them for their appalling behaviour. There is a serious integrity gap in the company which is once again displayed by their behaviour in this so called "proactive" action and Comreg's allowance of this is a scandal.

I have pointed to this statement before from the "Head of Customer Operations"

Enhanced customer trust is seen as the key to achieving greater business success

That was uttered on 20th November, 2010 when UPC were planning to drive a coach an four through their own Terms and Conditions in relation to the price increases. Nauseating behaviour!!!

http://www.upc.ie/pdf/UPC_wins_ICCSS_Award.pdf.

And once again the non gospel according to UPC when it applies to them:

16. Changing the Terms and Conditions
We retain the right to amend, modify or substitute these Terms and Conditions at any
time and we will notify you in writing 30 days in advance of doing so. Any such modification, amendment or substitution shall also be posted on our website at www.upc.ie. You have the right to withdraw from this Agreement without penalty if you do not accept the modification

17. Notices
Unless otherwise detailed in this Agreement, notices given under this Agreement should
be delivered by hand or by prepaid first class post or electronic mail either:-
(i) to us: at the address on this Agreement or on the last invoice or to an alternative
address notified to you;
(ii) to you: at the address in this Agreement or to an alternative address notified to us.

Absolutely no scope for Newspaper ads or texts there! But in UPC's world of trust Terms and Conditions only apply to their customers or should I say their subjects?