Quote:Has anyone yet tried to log a formal complaint with the regulators about 18866s behavioiur. I think all of us who are customers should now do so.
Neither 18866, Finarea or Connect Telecom are members of the Otelo (
www.otelo.org.uk) ombudsman complaint scheme and thus I have filed a complaint with Ofcom about 18866 not properly notifying their price increase, not answering my email of complaint about this and not belonging to an alternate disputes resolution scheem such as Otelo.
I would suggest that any other 18866 customer reading this thread should also call Ofcom on 020 7981 3040 to make a complaint about 18866's behaviour and their failure to belong to either the Otelo or any other complaints scheme.
I have just had a very unsatisfactory call back from a lady at the Ofcom Contact Centre on this issue as a result of which I have sent this email to Ofcom's Chief Operating Officer, Ed Richards.
-----Original Message-----
From: NonGeographicalMan
To: ed.richards@ofcom.org.uk
Cc: stephen.carter@ofcom.org.uk; matt.peacock@ofcom.org.uk;jackie.caspary@ofcom.org.uk
Subject: Failure to Take Action Against Finarea Over Non Membership of Otelo or other Alternate Disputes Resolution Procedures
Dear Mr Richards,
Complaint 2530078 - Against
www.18866.co.uk/www.finarea.ch for Lack of Alternate Disputes Resolution Procedure over Unannounced Call Price Increase
I have today tried to lodge a complaint with the Ofcom Contact Centre regarding the behaviour of a telecoms company called Finarea (
www.finarea.ch) that provides indirect call access routing on my phone line via their
www.call18866.co.uk and
www.1899.com telecoms brands. The company also operates a raft of other telecoms brands selling service to customers on uk phone lines including
www.18185.co.uk,
www.dialaround.co.uk,
www.dialwise.co.uk,
www.telesavers.co.uk,
www.voipbuster.co.uk and
www.voipcheap.co.ukMy complaint is that Finarea increased the connection charge on their 18866 service on 5th September without sending an email to me or any other customers to inform us and without making clear in their so called call price announcement before each call (which states that the call cost is 0p per minute but does not notify the 3p connection charge) that this change had taken place. Also my understanding is that although after 5th September they showed the new connection fee in one part of their website they did not show it in their main call price list. Furthermore 18866 have always previously been in the habit of emailing customers immediately to notify them of any reductions in their calling prices.
I have tried to complain to the company itself via its online web complaints form but so far it has chosen not to reply and there is no telephone number one can call to complain to either here or in Switzerland, where the parent company, Finarea, is based.
I lodged this as complaint number 2530078 in your contact centre this morning and the lady concerned said she would call me back once she had investigated the matter.
She then called back a few minutes later to say that Ofcom is aware that 18866 is not a member of an alternate disputes resolution procedure and has been trying to pursue this with the company for some time, but also fairly clearly from what she said these attempts had thus far been unsuccessful. She then went on to say that my only course of resolution over the matter was therefore to enter into litigation with the company under the terms of the contract. To say that the manner of the lady in the contact centre was fairly offhand and unsympathetic is to put it mildly but she was no better or worse than the generally appalling call crunching skills deployed by most of your so called contact centre staff.
Aside from wishing to indicate my continuing discontent at the manner in which calls from members of the public are handled by the Ofcom Contact Centre (where in essence the stock answer is that Ofcom cannot deal with almost any consumer's problem and that they should go away to Otelo, the telecommunications company concerned, to lawyers or to anywhere else that will save Ofcom having to do any work) I would like to know specifically what powers you have under the various Telecommunications acts to take action against an operator like Finarea and its many sub-brands to force them to join an alternate disputes resolution procedure? Also what powers do you have to take action against them if they refuse to respond to emailed customer complaints about billing and pricing and do not have a telephone number for customers to call?
I find it totally unacceptable that a regulator who has the primary mission of working on behalf of the citizen and consumer in terms of its statutory remit always chooses to hide behind its so called "light touch" methods of operation to do almost nothing that ever shows any form of action in the public interest.
I would therefore appreciate your comments on this specific matter before I take it up with my member of parliament as an example of Ofcom's general failure to make satisfactory use of its powers.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Regards,
NGM