I read all the earlier topics re the increase from 2p to 3p for 18866. I too emailed them saying this was an own-goal - that 3p was still cheap but they should have told us - and in any case I had never received a newsletter on any topic, let alone charges. No reply! However I have a new one. They SAY they email us in advance when our invoice is prepared. This time they didn't. Also I can't get it sent to my email address as that function no longer works. I emailed them and they said "simply look every month for your invoice"! No apology or explantion for no longer emailing a notification. And on the failure of the email system for downloading the invoice they said not a word. Good system but clearly run by very inefficient people!
Barry

I'd agree in general though it's odd I did get it work once. A friend left 18866 six weeks ago for 18899 and tells me that doesn't work either (same ownership, not surprising!). But what gets me is instead of replying to say "sorry, there's a fault, we'll fix it" they have the cheek to say "look every day for a bill and you won't miss it!

Barry

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And more to the point 18866/Finarea don't care because there is no phone number to get hold of them on and have a 2 way discussion with anyone.

This all comes about due to Finarea's failure to join an Alternate Dispute Resolution procedure for complaints they don't resolve to the customer's satisfaction.  Most telcos belong to www.otelo.org.uk but Finarea are resistant to this idea.

This matter is something Ofcom need pressurising to do something about so I would be grateful if others having problems with Finarea would email their concerns to Mr David Steward, Director of Investigatons at Ofcom - david.stewart@ofcom.org.uk   Although I have already spoken to Mr Stewart about the issue and Finarea is on his list of companies with no ADR to investigate it might help if others also brought their concerns to his attention.  Do not ring the Ofcom Contact Centre where Debbie or Michelle or Tracy will tell you that Ofcom have no power to do anything about Finarea and try to refer you to trading standards.   This is standard behavior by the slopey shouldered customer abusers in the so called Ofcom Contact Centre.  When MORI rang me to do a survey about my experience of this contact centre's work yesterday I took great pleasure in giving Ofcom lowest possible marks in almost every possible category.

Finarea is behaving very strangely by shafting the customers of its oldest and best loved brand (18866) and offering the best prices for 0870 and mobile calls on  its new brand www.18185.co.uk   I mean does it really think that 18866 customers won't continue to check the prices they are paying and won't get angry when they find they have been secretly raised behind the backs of the customers.  Finarea are behaving so badly that I would now also have concerns about them having my credit card details.  It may be safer to stick to Finarea's dial through call brands like www.dialaround.co.uk and www.bestminutes.co.uk

Not sure what will happen with JustDial now Centrica have put them up for sale? ???

Interestingly enough a friend told me there seemed to be a significant delay nowadays and that his bill only arrived 5 days after he clicked the 'email the bill' icon. We'll I'd tried about four times and it didn't work - except that this morning, a WEEK after I saw the bill and tried to download it four times, it did arrive: four times! So the system DOES work (apologies to 18866) - BUT takes a week from clicking download to getting it! I certainly have never seen a newsletter though and thought from other comments users of this site have made that nobody had either.

Barry

to elaborate - I don't apply for the bills to be emailed; they come automatically

maybe it was some button I ticked when signing up, and you might add it somehow

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Daniel,

So good to see you posting rather more often in the forum.  Have you just been released from some more pressing activities that you have been engaged in?

With regard to 18866 they always sent me an email with links to my bill whenever my expenditure hit their credit limit, which I think was £5.  This was less often than monthly, especially when calls were only 1p each!

18866 also sent me several emails advising of price reductions and this was precisely why I was so annoyed when they failed to send me any email about their two different 1p increases in connection fee.  Then to compound things they failed to reply to my emails of complaint about this.  Even though we know they do respond to emails that may enable customers to use their service more often.

Finarea are going to regret this when Ofcom's Director of Investigations, Mr David Stewart, turns his attention to their lack of an Alternate Dispute Resolution scheme.  They are now on his hit list folllowing my drawing his attention to them not having one and them having ignored my emails of complaint about their hidden price rise.

Finarea be warned.  We consider you to be the good guys and do not expect you to start behaving like conmen by hiding price rises in your tariff.  At least on their www.dialaround.co.uk or www.bestminutes.co.uk products the call price is clearly stated every single time that you dial.

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So you mean that you have been progressing the things more likely to advance the greater long term good of the cause compared to those like myself too readily tempted to engage in idle forum banter.  I know I should have been verifying some 084/7 numbers for the site but posting in the forum is so much more fun.

I was recently asked by a journalist at the Daily Mail for your phone number but had to unfortunately plead ignorance.  The only Daniel - found at http://www.192.com on a nationwide search is ex-directory, which I agree is probably understandable.

I did suggest he try Martin Lewis at The Guardian but he seemed to have an allergy to this advice.  I guess these journalists are at war with one another to get their stories into print first.  I also suggested he tried the forum's Contact Us box and the contact details quoted at http://www.djbnet.co.uk

We are doing well with responses to the Ofcom consultation except that many of them are very simplistic and fail to complain about the outrage of the 0845 scamming being allowed to continue while 0870 become geographic priced calls.  I wonder if there is any way with people who come to the site to look for a number to take them to a whole web page telling them about the consultation, its email addresses and the most important points to make in response.  And only after getting to that page could they scroll to the bottom and then press a button to get to the normal number lookup page.

I agree this is a rather ruthless suggestion but this is war with Ofcom and we must ensure they are inundated with lots of responses and also responses that completely pan their failure to deal with 0845 at the same time as 0870 on the ludicrous and totally untrue grounds that it is allegedly difficult to change ISP dialler phone numbers.  At the moment they are just going to get lots of responses saying "I agree with Ofcom's proposals on 0870" so they will claim everyone thinks they are wonderful and award themselves enormous bonuses!