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Hi there Legal Beagles I really, really need your help trying to get this resolved so any suggestions on how to proceed would be very much appreciated!
My Limited company signed a contract with a ISP (another ltd company) that was initially set up to supply 4 lines bonded together the contract was for 24 months initially at a rate of £100 a month (£25 per line) + VAT
After the 24 months was up we gave notice via email that we wanted to reduce the number of lines from 4 to 3 and a new order form was sent out by the ISP and signed by us and returned in the post to them towards the end of July 2016. On this order form it states: The contract will be formed if either: [ISP NAME] signs and sends back to you a copy of this order form, or [ISP NAME] sends an acknowledgement of your order, or [ISP NAME] starts setting-up the services under this Order Form.
The lines were reduced by their technical team, so we assumed everything was as it should be and the service continued until we decided to terminate the contract completely at the end of July 2019. We then picked up on a final invoice that they had actually still been billing us for the original 4 lines and so had overcharged us by £25 + vat x 36 months, so we informed them of this and asked them to credit it against any costs outstanding and refund the rest.
They then denied that they had never received the signed order form back reducing the lines to 3, but they had technically reduced the lines so must have received it??!
Since then they have been nothing but difficult and totally given us the run-around. I had equipment of theirs that needed to be returned but they wouldn't process the refund so that we could get it sorted so in the end after months of trying to resolve it with them I gave up and just wrote off the money I was owed, despite having an email from the MD saying that he authorised the refund, but the accounts department just refused to process it, and so we never got to the stage of organising for the equipment to be sent back.
Then I heard nothing until I got an email from a new finance lady a couple of weeks ago claiming that she had read through the email threads and how about we pay them £1500 to settle!!! I replied saying that if she had read the thread properly it was, in fact, them that owed us money and not to please not get in touch again unless it was to organise issue of the refund we were due.
Then this week I received a Claim Form from County Court Business Centre that states they are claiming for 'Lost equipment' which now seems to have escalated somehow to £4200 in the space of a week!! but the equipment has been here all the time all they needed to do was issue the refund and it would have all been resolved no problem!
We have had the equipment returned by courier this week as now looking into contract (attached) it appears I was in breach of this by not getting it sent back to them but we did ask in multiple emails over many months of emails that we wanted to get equipment back to them how can we resolve this etc.
My partner has got in touch with them to try and get them to drop it, and the lady he is speaking to seems helpful but they have been so underhand since we notified them of cancellation that I don't trust a word they are saying at all so in the background I need to prepare a defence.
Could you give me some advice on how to proceed please? It won't let me attach anything here for some reason but can share T&C's in a message if that helps.
My Limited company signed a contract with a ISP (another ltd company) that was initially set up to supply 4 lines bonded together the contract was for 24 months initially at a rate of £100 a month (£25 per line) + VAT
After the 24 months was up we gave notice via email that we wanted to reduce the number of lines from 4 to 3 and a new order form was sent out by the ISP and signed by us and returned in the post to them towards the end of July 2016. On this order form it states: The contract will be formed if either: [ISP NAME] signs and sends back to you a copy of this order form, or [ISP NAME] sends an acknowledgement of your order, or [ISP NAME] starts setting-up the services under this Order Form.
The lines were reduced by their technical team, so we assumed everything was as it should be and the service continued until we decided to terminate the contract completely at the end of July 2019. We then picked up on a final invoice that they had actually still been billing us for the original 4 lines and so had overcharged us by £25 + vat x 36 months, so we informed them of this and asked them to credit it against any costs outstanding and refund the rest.
They then denied that they had never received the signed order form back reducing the lines to 3, but they had technically reduced the lines so must have received it??!
Since then they have been nothing but difficult and totally given us the run-around. I had equipment of theirs that needed to be returned but they wouldn't process the refund so that we could get it sorted so in the end after months of trying to resolve it with them I gave up and just wrote off the money I was owed, despite having an email from the MD saying that he authorised the refund, but the accounts department just refused to process it, and so we never got to the stage of organising for the equipment to be sent back.
Then I heard nothing until I got an email from a new finance lady a couple of weeks ago claiming that she had read through the email threads and how about we pay them £1500 to settle!!! I replied saying that if she had read the thread properly it was, in fact, them that owed us money and not to please not get in touch again unless it was to organise issue of the refund we were due.
Then this week I received a Claim Form from County Court Business Centre that states they are claiming for 'Lost equipment' which now seems to have escalated somehow to £4200 in the space of a week!! but the equipment has been here all the time all they needed to do was issue the refund and it would have all been resolved no problem!
We have had the equipment returned by courier this week as now looking into contract (attached) it appears I was in breach of this by not getting it sent back to them but we did ask in multiple emails over many months of emails that we wanted to get equipment back to them how can we resolve this etc.
My partner has got in touch with them to try and get them to drop it, and the lady he is speaking to seems helpful but they have been so underhand since we notified them of cancellation that I don't trust a word they are saying at all so in the background I need to prepare a defence.
Could you give me some advice on how to proceed please? It won't let me attach anything here for some reason but can share T&C's in a message if that helps.
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