Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

[ilfordhammer1]

I recently switched to PlusNet to get fibre broadband. They messed up the installation by arranging for the switchover 26 days early, without notice to me, and landline calls only (no broadband connected). I work online and need broadband access. They admitted that they had a note on their system of the date agreed for the installation but had not then processed this.

To cut a long story short, I claimed for the cost of a Dongle contract to cover me while they sorted it out, and a small amount of lost work. £75 only. They failed to acknowledge several letters about the claim, while still responding to me on other issues. I asked to switch provider but as I was 1 week outside the cooling- off period, they said I must pay cancellation charges (£250), and that they would send the matter to debt collectors if necessary. This is outstanding.

I sued in the county court for my £75. PlusNet denied liability but paid me in full just before the defence was due.

For me PlusNet is a textbook case of how not to handle a consumer complaint. I was a new customer. I put together a cogent case for my losses, with supporting evidence. I didn't want to change supplier a second time.

PlusNet are owned by BT. They clearly know what they are doing in blanking consumers' claims pre-action in this way. Their attitude to consumers is appalling. And so, I want stick the knife in further and head off their pursuit of cancellation charges.

I have asked the court to enter judgment as they did not file a proper defence. I'm now also looking into complaining. I note that PlusNet have not signed up to the Communications Ombudsman which is surprising. However, they are a member of CISAS - the Communications and Internet Services Adjudication Scheme.

Basically, I want them to admit that they should respond properly to complaints about poor service, and to related claims for losses, and consider waiving cancellation charges when the reason stated is poor service. I think I'd have a decent shout in court that the charges are unfair in these circs.

Has anyone had experience of CISAS? Any other thoughts appreciated. Thanks for reading.

[R0b]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Communications Ombudsman and CISAS are two ADR schemes and all telecoms providers must belong to one or the other.

As for entering judgment, you have been paid £75 which was the full amount claiming? therefore I'd be wary of entering judgment as if judgment has been entered and they have to set aside because they have settled in full based on your claim and you have no reason to request summary judgment, then I wouldnt be surprised if they attempt to recover the £155 to set the fee aside (I know I would) as there is no reason for you to enter judgment when you have been paid. If however there is outstanding costs your claiming then that is a different story.

Have they cancelled your contract or are they still saying that your under contract and must pay the cancellation fee? The £250 could be the cost of contract you would pay as if you had it for the full 12 months or however long it was for.

You can't go CISAS and court, because you get judgment from the court CISAS will say you have already been compensated and vice versa - you could complain to CISAS regarding their poor service but might be worth pointing out if you win in court.

Might I ask what the basis of your claim is and what exactly are you claiming?

[ilfordhammer1]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Ok thanks for reply. They've paid in full so it's a shot to nothing to ask the court to enter judgment. I'm not going to apply formally - I've just sent a letter stating that the defendant didn't reply to pre-action correspondence and only paid up when the defence was due. For me, they should have judgment entered for failing to set out a proper defence and / or paying in full at this late stage after ignoring pre-action correspondence. If the judge isn't interested, I'll leave it there.

My claim was for financial losses caused by the sudden loss of internet coverage. I had to reschedule two teaching lessons and urgently take out a Dongle contract with O2 to continue my online teaching business. To be honest, I thought they might dispute the claims for being pure economic loss and / or that the contract was a consumer contract. But they've never responded to my points so I don't know what they were thinking.

I cancelled the contract and moved to Sky. The cancellation fee is a bit less than the minimum contract term. I should have cancelled within the first two weeks after the botched installation effort but I can argue that this mistake plus their poor communication with me later on was enough to justify terminating the contract with them without penalty. I don't know if that will work. At the moment, the ball is in their court on the cancellation charges. I am obviously an awkward s-d for them so perhaps they'll drop it.

[wales01man]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Is entering a Judgement on the record when no judgement exists the claim being paid in full contempt?

[Celestine]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Do NOT try to enter judgment!!!

This is not the right direction for your anger x

[ilfordhammer1]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Wow - I wasn't expecting that. I made it clear to the court in covering correspondence that the money has been received and why I think that judgment should be entered in default of a defence. I asked the court to place the correspondence before the DJ. I don't know how that would amount to contempt.

[stevemLS]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

If you ask the court to enter judgment where no debt exists, in my opinion at the very least that is an abuse of process and if the court mistakenly complied with your request, you would find yourself liable for the other side's costs in having it set aside.

[Celestine]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

If you look, the 'small claims court system' is called "Moneyclaim". Its designed to cheaply resolve simple money disputes. You can't expect a Judge to make a grand judgment in your favour declaring PlusNet to be a dreadful firm with poor customer service etc etc....the court is not designed to do that and the £30 fee you paid to issue this claim does not cover anything like that level of complexity.

Did you get your court fee back though...?

[ilfordhammer1]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

If you look, the 'small claims court system' is called "Moneyclaim". Its designed to cheaply resolve simple money disputes. You can't expect a Judge to make a grand judgment in your favour declaring PlusNet to be a dreadful firm with poor customer service etc etc....the court is not designed to do that and the £30 fee you paid to issue this claim does not cover anything like that level of complexity.

Did you get your court fee back though...?

Ok thanks. Yes - I got it back. I accept your point. Let's say you had a small value claim, the money was paid before the defence, but you still wanted to get a judgment on liability on a point of wider principle: would any county court entertain such a claim? How would you proceed? It's not something I'll do here but for future reference.

[R0b]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

No is the answer. If you are making a claim for costs on a breach of contract/law and those costs are met, the courts will not give any judgment as your claim has been satisfied. Judges sit in a court of law and not morals (although morality does have some influence in certain cases).

If you wanted the judge to listen then you should have refused to accept the amount and proceeded to court. The problem with that is you wont always get the costs you are claiming for, and you could have ended up with less than you claimed. Although in this situation the fact that you can quantify the cost and evidence it then you would have likely got something close to it.

[ilfordhammer1]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

I've told the court and other side that I will forget about entering judgment and apologised.

I have now heard that PlusNet will proceed with the claim for cancellation charges. Given the clerical error leading to mistakes with the installation in my case, does anyone rate my chances in court? My Achilles heel is that I still had time after the mistake to cancel within the cooling-off period. The truth is that I was still ready to give them a chance to redeem themselves at that point. But they then sent conflicting messages about the new installation date for fibre, and failed to respond to my letters about my losses. I ended up losing confidence in them. I cancelled not more than 4 weeks after taking out the contract.

- - - Updated - - -

No is the answer. If you are making a claim for costs on a breach of contract/law and those costs are met, the courts will not give any judgment as your claim has been satisfied. Judges sit in a court of law and not morals (although morality does have some influence in certain cases).

Ok thanks.

[R0b]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

I assume that by you saying you switched to Sky that the service for fibre broadband never started with Plusnet you were awaiting for it to be installed and activated? Did you take out any other services or was it just fibre?

Can you also give a date on when you placed this order? September or October?

[ilfordhammer1]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

I assume that by you saying you switched to Sky that the service for fibre broadband never started with Plusnet you were awaiting for it to be installed and activated? Did you take out any other services or was it just fibre?

Can you also give a date on when you placed this order? September or October?

Thanks. It was Sept. Did something relevant change in October?

After the botched switchover, they installed ADSL as a stopgap but I cancelled the original fibre order before the revised installation date. We also had landline but nothing else.

[R0b]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Yeah consumer laws changed on October 2. Have they issued any letter before action or just stated that they are going to commence proceedings to recover that amount?

You would probably have a good chance of defending this matter I reckon, the fact that they switched over installation 26 days earlier than anticipated is a strong point for you. Yes you had the option to cancel but as you say you wanted to give them an opportunity to rectify the problem. Their terms seem a bit vague also on charges when you cancel.

You can cancel a service anytime up to 14 calendar days after the day we accepted your order ... If you cancel after we start to provide the service, you must pay the service subscription charge for any period that the service was made available to you and for any use of that service not covered by the subscription charge, up to the date that you told us you wanted to cancel, and return any equipment we supply that is needed to use that service.

What happens if you cancel 14 days after the order but before the service has actually started? It says you will be charged for the subscription service once it has started but doesn't refer to any charges in between - something else to point out to them and so you shouldn't be charged.

[ilfordhammer1]

Re: Claim against PlusNet successful but their attitude towards consumers still poor

Yeah consumer laws changed on October 2. Have they issued any letter before action or just stated that they are going to commence proceedings to recover that amount?

You would probably have a good chance of defending this matter I reckon, the fact that they switched over installation 26 days earlier than anticipated is a strong point for you. Yes you had the option to cancel but as you say you wanted to give them an opportunity to rectify the problem. Their terms seem a bit vague also on charges when you cancel.



What happens if you cancel 14 days after the order but before the service has actually started? It says you will be charged for the subscription service once it has started but doesn't refer to any charges in between - something else to point out to them and so you shouldn't be charged.

Thank you very much. They've only threatened so far. I cancelled more than 14 days after the ADSL stopgap was put in, but not much longer. I never actually received the fibre service which was my original reason for switching from my previous supplier. I also think their poor service in ignoring my letters claiming losses arising from their mistake is relevant to show a breakdown of trust. I'll look up their service standards about replying to customer complaints if I need to. I'm willing to have my day in court over this. PlusNet's attitude to consumers is poor. If anyone here is interested, I'll keep the forum posted.