Or VodaCON as I now call them are a bunch of pricks.

When I had 2 months remaining on my 24 month contract, I called them up to enquire how much it would cost to pay off the contract as I had seen some really good deals on PAYG (Giffgaff) and was planning on switching.

I got a call back from their sales people who offered me a 300 minute, unlimited texts and internet* for £10 a month. What’s more, the guy informed me, it would be a 30 day rolling contract so I could cancel anytime by giving them 30 days notice. He also said, that if I agreed to this, he could run it from midnight that day, thus saving me the 2 months left on my contract.

This sounded great so I agreed.

And soon started noticing that Vodacon’s PAYG service was nowhere near as efficient as their contract one – people couldn’t call me (kept getting the message my number was unavailable despite having a strong signal), and texts weren’t appearing for up to 3 days.

At this point, I called them up to cancel and was informed I’d have to pay for the remainder of the 12 month contract – WTF? I pointed out I didn’t have a 12 month contract, but a 30 day rolling contract. The customer (dis)service monkey said they’d have to check the sales call and get back to me within 7 days (almost 2 weeks ago now).

I cancelled the direct debit paying them, activated my Giffgaff sim and thought it would get sorted…

I heard nothing so contacted them via their website email and got this email from them:

Hello Paul,

Thank you for writing to Vodafone Customer Support.

I understand that you wish to cancel your contract due to the poor services.

I’ve checked the network coverage in your area and can confirm that the 2G and 3G network coverage in your area is good. Therefore, it could be a handset issue.

You can take the handset to the nearest Vodafone Store to get it checked. You can find the nearest Vodafone Store by referring to the link below:

http://online.vodafone.co.uk/dispatch/Portal/appmanager/vodafone/wrp?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=Page_Help_StoreLocator&pageID=SL_0001

Further, if you are still willing to cancel the subscription number 078yaddayadda, I wish to inform you that you are still within your contract term.

Your contract will end on 14/07/2012.

If you wish to terminate the before the contract end date then an early termination fee (ETF) will be applicable on the account. The ETF is £86.61 as of today. This amount is nothing but the line rental till the contract end date and is calculated on a pro rata basis. This amount will reduce on a daily basis.

Pffft…completely missing the points I raised – I replied:

I notice you’ve not read my original email. The only reason I signed up for a 30 DAY ROLLING CONTRACT was that I DIDN’T want to be tied to a contract for 12 or 24 months – listen to the call your people made to me and you’ll see that was what I was offered. Why, when I was thinking of going PAYG would I tie myself to another contract?

Your point about a handset issue is rubbish – I tried the sim in 3 separate phones with the same (lack of) service. I even got a new sim sent to see if that would rectify the issues – it didn’t.

As my original message stated – I’ve paid this month’s bill, and will pay the next one. That gives you ample notification of the 30 days required. There will be no ETF paid, as I didn’t enter into a 12 month contract with you.

I would also request that you send me a transcript of the call made by your representative where (you claim), I agreed to the 12 month contract and NOT the 30 day contract I did in fact agree to.

I await your response (and hopefully this will address the original points, and those made in this email).

Paul Bennett

Fairly straightforward (I thought). Then came this reply:

Hello Paul,

Thank you for contacting Vodafone Customer Support.

I have reviewed your account and confirm that you are on a 12 months contract with us which started on 15/07/2011 and 14/07/2012.

Please be informed that 30 days is your billing cycle and you are on a 12 months contract with us.

If you wish to terminate the contract before the contract end date then an early termination fee (ETF) will be applicable on the account. The ETF is £94.28 as of today. This amount is nothing but the line rental till the contract end date and is calculated on a pro rata basis. This amount will reduce on a daily basis.

As per the business policy, we also need you to give us a 30 days’ notice for cancellation of the contract. Please get in touch with us again after making a payment for the ETF amount applicable and we will then schedule a 30 day notice period on your account.

Hmm…first thing I noticed here is the ETF is going up despite them saying it will reduce on a daily basis. I fired off this reply:

Interesting to see the alleged ETF is rising…

I’m still waiting for the requested transcript of the sales call where I’m alleged to have entered into a new contract – indeed, I’m still waiting for customer services to contact me after reviewing this call.

The points in my previous email stand: I will pay one more bill as that takes me far outside the requested 30 days for cancellation of my 30 day rolling contract. No ETF will be paid whatsoever as I was AT NO POINT informed it was a 12 month contract as you will see from the sales call.

Paul Bennett

Now it’s not a huge sum, but it’s the principle – I’m not paying for something I didn’t order 😐

*Unlimited internet is actually 500MB a month – on Giffgaff it’s UNLIMITED 🙂

EDIT: Realised that posting a phone number isn’t such a good idea even if it will be deactivated within a month…