Orange (UK) forced to climbdown by customers

ardmacha

from Guardian

Power to the people!!!

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Mobile phone giant Orange has reversed its decision to put the price of its calls up next month after the Guardian contacted it suggesting it was breaching its terms and conditions by not allowing customers to leave.

The company recently sent text messages to its customers informing them that from mid-September the cost of calls not included in their talk plans, such as 0870 numbers and accessing their voicemail, would rise from 5p to 14.7p a minute.

At the same time it said it would increase the charge for browsing the internet to a flat 60p a day, regardless of how much time users spent online.

Many customers took the opportunity to cancel their contracts on receiving the news, as Orange's terms and conditions allow them to do so if there is an "excessive increase in the charges" made.

However, shortly after the text alert prompted hundreds of customers to leave, Orange started turning down cancellation requests, reportedly telling customers they couldn't leave if they were not already using their full calls allowance or if they had never before called 0870 numbers.

It told some customers that if they had a problem with the decision they should contact telecoms watchdog Ofcom.

Outraged Orange customers then contacted guardian.co.uk/money and posted complaints on consumer website Bitterwallet suggesting Orange had breached its own terms and conditions.

Posting on Bitterwallet, Orange customer 'Sam' said: "I tried to cancel on Saturday and got the same response, 'you aren't entitled to cancel as you have not gone over your minutes in the last 3 months'."

"I told them [customer services] that I might go over my minutes in the future though and his reply was 'yeah, and I might win the Lottery tonight!'."

After being contacted by the Guardian, Orange today made a spectacular U-turn admitting it had "made a mistake in not recognising the frustration and confusion that our customers would feel as a result of [the changes]."

A spokesman said that as a result Orange has decided not to go ahead with the price increases.

"It is normal practice for businesses to make pricing changes, and whilst we clearly cannot rule out any future changes we know that transparency and consistency in our policies is extremely important to our customers," he said.

"Orange apologises to those customers who found the messages unclear and any subsequent misunderstanding this has caused. We will be reviewing all policies and procedures for price changes to make sure that they are clearer in future."

However, for those customers who have already confirmed their cancellation and requested to transfer their number to another provider, the cancellation still stands.

Paul Smith, editor of Bitterwallet, said: "This is an issue that caused plenty of anger and misery amongst Orange customers.

"Dozens of readers cited examples of call centre operators deliberately misleading them with regards to Orange's own terms and conditions. If Orange had informed all customers of the changes and allowed those who wished to cancel to do so, this would have worked out far better for everyone.

"Instead, they've damaged their own reputation and future revenues, and been forced to admit they got it wrong."

Rsaeire

This article just goes to show that no matter what country you're in, mobile provider are always in the news for the wrong reasons.