Yes, the offer was in writing. Okay I'll start with a SAR and see what that drags up! Should I address it to the PO box address for Lloyds PPI, or to another address? My local branch?

Yes, I just want to know the numbers are right, but how do I get them to reveal it? They just refuse to answer orally, and in written form they simply ignore the question! I don't think I've got anything to lose at court, its not a vexatious case as its reasonable for me to ask that their figures are right. and even in the event they win and get costs against me I don't have any income to pay from so they can have a pound a week willingly! No, I've never sent them a SAR as I thought they'd simply reply 'we don't have any info going back that far' or only pick out selected bits of info that supported their position and hide the rest. Is it a bit late in the day to ask them for it now though?

I will try and be succinct, promise! Please ignore issue of eligibility for repayment/compensation, as Lloyds have already accepted this. I initially contacted Lloyds in October '13 asking if I'd had PPI as I simply couldn't remember. That's my bad, I know, but I'm not good now with long term memory. They acknowledged receipt and said they'd look into it and I heard from them on the phone once when they called and asked lots of questions about what my credit card was for, etc. At the end of November with an offer of £630. They said that due to passage of time they no longer had detailed records, but that their offer was "equal to the average compensatory payment taking into account the period during which you held the credit card and were paying for your PPI cover". It did NOT say how long that period was, so I couldn't work out what the offer represented per month. The letter included examples of how refund calculations worked, but none of the examples were of any use to my circumstance because they all dealt with known figures of payment. Their letter had a phone number, which turned out to be a call centre in the Philippines. I called and said that if only they'd told me they didn't have any records, I could have given them some help with that, so could I please speak to the department that had made my offer. The call centre said they could not put me through as that department had no incoming phone lines (yeah, right) but that they could 'escalate' my claim. Escalation apparently involves them writing notes on my file that I'd called, which the department who calculated offers could read, and who'd then consider what I'd said. It didn't seem very sensible to filter all communications via a third party, especially one who's first language wasn't English, so I asked how else I might communicate directly with the relevant department, but was told this was the only route available. I asked when I had started paying PPI. They didn't know, because the only information they had access to was the letter that had been written to me, and that didn't have that information in it. Well obviously not, otherwise I wouldn't have needed to ask, would I? I asked how many months I had been paying PPI, and again they didn't know, but they would 'escalate' it for me. I asked if escalation would mean that whoever was reading the notes would call me so I could ask them my questions, but the call centre said they did not know whether anyone would call me back. Frustrated, I asked them what questions they COULD answer, but the irony went over their heads. They could do no more than confirm what had been written to me, and take note of whatever I said and put that on my record where someone else might read it at some other time. I said that I could not possibly be in a position to decide whether the offer was fair if I could not get certain information about it, so I really did need to speak to the department that they appeared to be a firewall for. I asked for an email address for the right department, and after much argument was given one. I sent a detailed letter explaining the questions I had, including the ones I'd asked above, and also asked how the 'average' had been calculated. There's another hole in my memory here – at some point before I wrote to them I got the information that I had paid PPI from May 2002 to March 2005, but I can't remember now them giving that to me. They had initially said they couldn't get that info, but somehow or other I have those dates now on a scrappad. By some miracle, I found a statement from March 2005, which showed a payment that month of £47 PPI against a balance of approx. £6,100. I said that I did not remember this period, but that I did know that I couldn't possibly have cleared such a large balance quickly and it would take many months to clear down such a large balance, so it was reasonable to believe that I'd be paying that off for a considerable period and on each payment making further PPI payments too. The statement showed the previous months balance as being in line with that month, so I was able to work out that months PPI payment too. I said that I would expect, but had no genuine knowledge one way or the other, that it would have taken me quite some time to build up an outstanding balance of just a few pounds under the credit limit which was shown at £6,250, so again it was reasonable to assume that I'd been making PPI payments on cumulative balances leading up to the month for the statement I had. With the two known figures for PPI, March which was shown and February's that I calculated from the carried over outstanding balance, I got an average of £40 per month paid. If I were to assume that this was a representative figure over the lifetime of the PPI contributions, that would equate to £1400 paid. That's without the interest at 8% as Lloyds said, purely because I don't know how to work that out cumulatively and until when. I know its a huge assumption to say that the payment I did know is representative, but at least its a figure from MY account rather than an average of other peoples which is how Lloyds want to work out my offer. Finally I asked that someone from that department actually call me on the phone, so that we could resolve any questions between us easily, and complained that Lloyds were effectively preventing me from speaking to them which I found to be inequitable given that they regularly insist on me providing methods of them communicating with me. I emailed that off to them, and promptly got it straight back – the server at Lloyds had bounced the email because the address didn't exist. Somewhat annoyed, I called the Philippines again and complained that the address they'd provided didn't work and insisted that I speak to someone in the claims management department in England, but they still refused to give me anything other than an 'escalation' note on my file. I sent the letter to the PO box address instead, and three weeks later got a letter from them. With baited breath I opened it, and discovered it was nothing but an acknowledgement that I'd written to them. I did phone the Philippines several more times over coming weeks, asking when something would happen. They replied that they didn't know, but that they'd 'escalate' my question, and someone may or may not phone me but that it would certainly be considered. Each time I called I had to go through the routine of confirming a number they could reach me on, despite them not ringing me on it. I went in to my branch and threw a paddy there that all I was asking was the courtesy of a return phone call, and after an unpleasant hour they came back and said they didn't know how to get someone to talk to me either but that there was no point in visiting the branch again. This Friday I had my regular frustrating call to the Philippines and got a different answer – I had been written back to, and the following day the letter duly arrived. It contained an offer, of £8. This time though, it said that a breakdown of the offer was made according to my cards. On one of the four cards I'd had with Lloyds, my card balance at 14 March 2011 was apparently zero. What relevance the 14 March date had wasn't mentioned. It did say that, if I'd not purchased PPI, my balance on that day on that card would be -£449.16. It did not say how it would be that amount, just that it would be that figure. An 8% interest calculation of £188.57 was added to 28 February 2014. The total of those figures wasn't shown, but it adds up to £637.73, leaving, according to them, £8.78 owing which they'd pay into my account. No mention was made of any of the issues I raised in my letter, or of the statement of the period that I'd provided. No mention was made of how they'd managed to find my actual payment details now, when they hadn't managed this when they made their original offer. No mention was made of the remaining three credit cards. In short, it is my firm belief that Lloyds are lying to me. Their statement about £449.16 being paid in premiums cannot be true, given that it equates to less than ten months premiums equivalent to the one month we do know, and my knowledge that such a sum would have taken a long time to both build up and be repaid. Dividing their offer (before interest) up over the 35 months they say I paid PPI comes to £12.77 per month and I believe I paid a lot more than this. I'm also very suspicious that Lloyds now appear to have found my records, but don't include them in their letter. I don't believe they HAVE found them. So, what to do now. I can ring the Philippines, where they'll happily 'escalate' my argument. That escalation doesn't mean in and of itself that someone will ever contact me, and I could happily wait from now until the end of time for a response which may not come. I could go into my branch again, but they happily admit they have no knowledge of how to reach the relevant people. I could write to them at the PO box address, but since they ignored entirely the content of my previous letter I'm not exactly hopeful of a positive outcome on a second try. I could complain to the Ombudsman, which has the satisfaction of knowing that there is a cost to Lloyds for the service, but I don't know exactly what I'm asking for. It is entirely possible that in a single conversation on the phone with Lloyds they could reassure me that their figures are correct, fair, and most importantly demonstrable, but they steadfastly refuse to do this. I won't go into here why they upheld my complaint but it is fair to say that they acknowledge misselling it to me, so why is it that I can't be afforded the simple courtesy of a phone call. I'll even pay for it, if they'd give me a number to reach. If, as a result of that call, we agree that Lloyds have got it right, the matter is closed, and if we agree that they've got it wrong, we can work out to what number and pay it to me. Since I can't ask the Ombudsman to force Lloyds to ring me, I don't really think that's what I'm looking for. I think I've been shabbily treated by an organisation that has admitted they took money from me that they shouldn't have done, and what I'd really like to do is sue them in the small claims court. I'd like to sue for £1400 as the figure I believe I have paid, the interest to date on that, an amount of hours at the allowable rate to compile the case, and exemplary damages for the avoidable inconvenience and stress Lloyds have put me to in not working together to resolve the issue without recourse to external parties. What I'm looking for here is constructive criticism on the above. We can leave aside the argument of eligibility since that's previously resolved, but am I being stupid/ungrateful/stubborn in not just taking the offer, or is it fair that I should have some faith in its integrity? My sincere and genuine thanks to anyone having read this far!

Is it only me, or does anyone else think its hilarious that due to the evil ways of Google Ads and the fact that I got a quote recently from a certain company, this page with its somewhat negative view of Hastings Direct has an advert at both the top and bottom of the page for.... Hastings Direct!

Seemingly not then, no

Quick update on this bunch of cretins, When the xxxxxxx, oops sorry I meant support staff member, who took the additional fifty quid off me asked for my payment, I gave it begrudgingly and only because I got a specific assurance that this would expedite matters and get me a computer faster than any other method of resolution. The quote that was emailed to me, the invoice that was mailed to me straight after the payment, and the thief herself, ALL said a delivery date of 2nd March. But as I said in my first post, that then slipped to 14th. And today I got a phone call at 7pm from someone who apparently works in the 'social media department', who's job it is to monitor various forums, Twitter, etc and 'help' customers there. He'd come across one of my rants at their pathetic service and had decided to assist. I say 'assist', but what I meant to say was 'navel-gaze', because his help appeared to consist of looking up my order number (which I have the URL to look at myself) and observe that my computer was still 'in production' and so was not now going to be with me on Monday 14th after all. What could he do about this? Ummm, well he could send an 'expedite form'. Wow, thanks. Because, hey, it's not as though there isn't any expedite forms on my service tag already, is it? Oh hang on, yes there are... The real problem to me now is, there doesn't seem to be a decent way forward. I mean yes, of course, I can have a refund, but as I've pointed out already that leaves me with a stonking loss. And, of course, I'd have to wait several weeks for it. Dell would have caused me severe inconvenience, generally been pathetic with service, and sat on my money for a month, and then they'd make me wait to just get my money back. I want to go out and purchase a computer of similar specification locally and simply sue Dell for the cost of it, and I can't work out whether or not that would be seen as me taking the least-costly way of resolving the issue while at the same time ensuring that I don't suffer any more inconvenience than I already have. Any thoughts/precedents for this sort of thing please?

Lets come in at the top: xxx has taken virtually all the large franchises in the Southend on Sea (Essex) area over the last few years. Well, okay, but of what relevance is this? 2. The technicians do not earn a basic wage.If they find nothing wrong with your car (and they always will find a problem) they do not earn a penny. You're suggesting the repair staff are all commission-based? I have to say I find that unlikely (I'm not suggesting you're not telling the truth, just that I'd be surprised). Anyway, in and of itself there's nothing 'unlawful' about that. 3. Cars are targeted for parts that the technician will be given a long book time to change by the manufacturer regardless of whether it requires changing. Technicians will more often know what part needs changing before they see the car and often this part is not even changed. If this were true, or much more to the point if it can be shown to be true, its a matter for the local Trading Standards (who will if necessary involve the police). Your job is simply to pass the information to them, and possibly chivvy them along a little now and then to get a satisfactory outcome. What your dad doesn't need is a bankrupt daughter alongside everything else, and losing a libel case could do that and more. 4. Technicians that don't find faults with cars which the company know are profitable will not last more than a few weeks - staff turn over is brisk You're suggesting that the management team are actively involved in this '[problem]' and encourage staff to offer unnecessary repairs? Again, not "I know", but "I can prove"? 5 Sales cars are fitted with second hand parts that are taken from customers cars (that didn't need changing) to save the technician money.The less they spend on getting a sold car ready the more they earn,the trouble is existing customers are paying for newer customers cars to be fixed. I'm lost here - do you mean that they'll remove parts from customers cars in for repair, and then fit those parts onto stock that they're selling? So what do they tell the customer with a bit missing off his car? "It must have fallen off?!" 6. The company source aftermarket parts and fit them at main dealer prices. Its a bit ambiguous here. Do you mean to say the company purchase and fit 'pattern' parts? Well there's nothing wrong there, unless they're passing them off as genuine OEM parts. If that's the case, it should be very straightforward to settle - just ask them to show you the invoice from Ford or whoever for the bit they purchased for your car. If they can't show it, tell them you're refusing to pay until they can. 7. Customers cars are sometimes targeted by thieves whilst parked outside for parts. It is normal for customers to be told those parts will need to be replaced at their own expense. They have a duty of care over your car while its with them, and if a theft occurs while they have it then they'll need to claim from their own insurance. If they're not willing to do that, issue a small claims summons! 8. The company has expanded too fast and has cash flow problems. Nothing to do with you I'm afraid 9. Any staff that question these practices are swiftly removed. I am in discussion with several people about where I go with this but at this stage would like to make people aware of this company. Sarah. I will be starting a blog shortly to support victims of xxx,please pm for more details. Really? And nobody has 'blown the whistle' before? DON'T make people aware - that's TS's problem. They have deep pockets if they get it wrong - you don't. And don't even dream of starting a blog, unless you're going to host it somewhere in Latvia under an assumed name and a disposable email address, and you don't post anything at all that can identify you individually!

I'll give it a whirl, thanks

There is, apparently, no complaint department anywhere in the world for Dell - the website address only gives the phone number for tech support, so I thought I'd express my dissatisfaction about not having someone to send a letter to by plastering it over the internet instead! If you're looking for a horror story on why NOT to buy from Dell, read on... *********** I am writing to formally complain about the extremely poor support I have received at the hands of Dell since purchasing a new laptop from them recently. Dell have consistently failed to meet an acceptable standard of customer service, have delivered a faulty product straight from the box, have failed numerous times to honour a promise to call back, have failed to show up at my home on two days (in the process costing me two days work), and now appear to think that offering me a replacement machine in a couple of weeks is a ‘reasonable’ method of dealing with the problem. On 14th February I purchased a reconditioned laptop from the Dell Outlet, and my credit card was immediately debited for the full amount. At no time up until the point where funds were taken did Dell make any reference to a date for delivery, and I was annoyed to find that my computer would not be with me for nine days. However, on 25th February it arrived. Issue 1 - Computer failed to boot after starting up for the first time and running a number of automated processes. The error message indicated that the recovery partition had failed to initialise. I had to search out a phone number for support online, since the box that Dell delivered to me contained a laptop computer held in place by plastic film, and a power lead. Nothing else was in the box at all, not even so much as a remittance slip or a piece of paper confirming the specification of the machine. On phoning support, we spent some time running through memory and hard drive tests before a faulty hard drive was diagnosed. An engineer was booked for the following day. Issue 2 - I was very disappointed to find a newly-reconditioned and checked machine should be faulty ‘out of the box’, necessitating a second day working at home (I’m only allowed a few of these per year) but waited patiently for the engineer to arrive, and he failed to show up. At 5pm I contacted Dell by phone to be told he was definitely coming, but he still failed to materialise. Issue 3 - First thing the following morning I phoned Dell again and was told that he would definitely be coming today now instead, meaning my third consecutive day not going in to work. I waited until early afternoon and then decided to call Dell back yet again. This turned out to be fortunate, because Dell told me that an engineer was not coming after all - they didn’t have one of the parts required to fix the machine. Dell were unable to explain why they had let me wait for two days for this fictitious engineer to arrive when they knew he wouldn’t come. Issue 4 - the missing part was a hard drive, and now Dell informed me that not only did they not have one with the engineer, but they didn’t know where another one might be. They said that they would definitely “expedite” getting a hard drive to me, but they were unable to suggest when that might be - it would just be “as soon as possible”. A day? Two days? A week? Dell said they would hope that it would be within a week but they were unable to guarantee that. Unsurprisingly, I wasn’t thrilled about the idea of waiting a further week on top of the ten days I’d already waited before getting a computer that actually booted up, and told them this wasn’t an acceptable response. Issue 5 - Dell insisted that I would just have to wait until they found a drive and then sent it to me direct, and were quite happy that it was perfectly reasonable to expect a customer to wait seventeen days from the point where Dell took his money until they gave him a working machine, and when I asked for contact details for Customer Services I was told I was already talking to them, notwithstanding that they’d just told me they were in Technical Support. I asked instead for contact details for a Complaints Department, and was told that there wasn’t one(!). Issue 6 - After a further series of phone calls on Dell’s premium rate phone number, I was eventually told that “as a gesture of goodwill” I could have a refund. I said that I was very grateful, but I didn’t want their ‘goodwill’ since I had a much more reliable statutory right to return the goods for a refund anyway if that were my chosen remedy, and that I didn’t need Dell’s ‘permission’ to do so. Dell said that my purchase was exempt from the DSR 7-day ‘cooling off’ period since it was a machine built uniquely for me, but couldn’t answer how that could be the case when I had bought it from them ‘second-hand’ via the Outlet and it had already been configured for its *original* owner. The DSR issue was irrelevant anyway, since the machine was faulty ‘out of the box’ and so could be rejected as unfit. Issue 7 - Dell said that if I wanted a refund, they would “action” this only once the machine had been returned to them. They suggested that a collection of the computer would happen within five working days from today, and that it would then take up to a further ten working days to arrive back with them. At that point they would authorise a refund, which would take up to ten *more* days. I said to Dell that this process stank of mistrust on their part, which I found ironic since it was Dell who had failed to deliver on their promises, not the customer. Dell said that “a manager” would call me back within a few hours. Issue 8 - no call back arrived that day so I contacted Dell again the following morning. I told Dell that a straight refund was not an acceptable outcome, because if I *were* to have a refund then I wanted it right away so I could go and purchase a replacement computer, not have to wait three weeks for the money back *on top* of the ten days they’d already had my money. I reminded Dell that, as well as them having my money for a total of about a month without giving me anything for it, I would also be out of pocket for the original day waiting for delivery, the two days waiting for an engineer who never came, several hours on their expensive phone number, and a few years off my life expectancy. Dell said again that a manager would call me back, this time within two hours. The person who called me back again said I could have a refund and so had obviously not read the notes on my account where I had patiently explained that this outcome was unsatisfactory *solely* because Dell’s failure to notify me of two failed callouts had already incurred considerable costs to me. After speaking to two further people I was eventually transferred to someone who said he was the “customer care manager within technical support” and that he would definitely deal with my problem. He listened to my explanation that all I wanted was the working computer that I had paid for, but that I wanted that to happen in a much more realistic timescale than had been previously offered. He said that he would authorise a replacement computer instead, and that in view of the wait I had already experienced, the lack of a suitable response from Dell, the two missed engineer appointments, and the dozen or so calls to India, he would authorise an upgrade from the specification I had already purchased. Issue 9 - He said that he personally would not be able to call me back, but that he would ensure someone called me that same day, and that between us we would iron out a specification for a replacement machine. That call failed to materialise, which given the current record is no more than I expected. Issue 10 - I rang, again, the following morning and was eventually passed through to Leena, who asked me what I wanted in my ‘new’ machine. I was initially confused, because she didn’t have any parameters as to what was possible, but it became clear when I specced up a machine as near as we could get to my own. She simply deducted the price I’d already paid from the list price of the replacement, and asked how I was going to pay it. More than a little annoyed that yet another person hadn’t been passed the necessary information, I went through with her what I’d discussed with the previous manager. The new machine was no superior in specification than its predecessor, with the exception that I’d now got a 7010 rather than a 5010, but had dropped from an i5-540 to an i3-370 processor which I thought was a fairly ‘even’ deal. The difference in cost was £150, and Leena was adamant that this was the sum needed to let me have it. I argued that I’d *already* paid for a computer and hadn’t got it, and I couldn’t see why I should pay again. She said that Dell’s position was that they were already ‘doing me a favour’ by letting me exchange at all, and I countered that I had every right to refuse the machine I had as faulty, and demand a replacement. She suggested that they’d knock £10 off the price and didn’t seem happy when I laughed at her. I reminded her that I’d lost three days work so far and would now have to lose a fourth when the new computer arrived, and that I’d spent a lot more than £10 in phone calls alone. After another hour and a half phone call, she got permission from someone to charge me a mere £50. I was still unhappy that I’d had to pay any further amount at all, as it was my position that I’d already paid for a working computer a week and a half ago. I asked her to confirm by email the specification of the machine, and then thought to look on the Dell Outlet again. At the exact same moment as I was doing a deal with Leena, an identically specced laptop was being offered on the Outlet for £26 *less* than the amount that I’d already paid over the two payments (my initial purchase, plus the £50 Leena had taken). I took a screenshot and emailed it to Leena, along with a request that she confirm I was being given a ‘new’ computer and not a reconditioned one, since if I was getting a second-user machine I was effectively being *charged* £26 to have been messed around by Dell! Issue 11 - Leena finally emailed an acceptance of my condition that the computer be brand new, and a confirmation of its specification. Attached was the invoice, with an estimated delivery date of 2nd March. The following day I got a tracking number, and clicking the link gave me a delivery date of 14th March instead. Leena didn’t reply to an email, so I called again. Issue 12 - I spoke, eventually after being passed round lots of people who said they couldn’t help, to Raghuvendra, who apparently was yet another Customer Service manager. He promised that absolutely he’d get that date changed and have the computer with me by the end of this week, and agreed that to delay any further was potentially in breach of the Sale of Goods Act’s requirement that any remedy must be completed without significant inconvenience to the customer. He said that, in his words, he would “without fail” call me back by midday the following day to confirm a new date, if I would just give him that extra day to sort it out. Midday the following day, he hadn’t called back… Raghuvendra was mysteriously unavailable when I finally managed to get through to the department he worked in, but his colleague Dolson told me that the estimated date of 14th was the correct one and that it didn’t matter what Raghuvendra may have said it couldn’t be changed. Why didn’t I get the promised call back to say that? Dolson didn’t know, but insisted that Raghuvendra was in a meeting and couldn’t answer that question himself. I asked why I could make a purchase on Dell’s website and have it delivered in two days, but I was going to have to wait a further 14 days for my new machine. Apparently this was because ‘my’ machine was coming from the Far East, but the ones on Dell’s website were already in Europe. Okay, why can’t I have one of them then? The answer was apparently that Dell were ‘unable’ to interrupt the supply chain and get me one of those. Okay, how about I *buy* one of those, get it in two days, and then you refund my credit card with the amount I paid for it? This was *also* not something that Dell could do. Dolson suggested that it was pointless us talking any more, because I wasn’t going to get any alternatives and I was just going to have to put up with it - I could wait a few weeks for a refund, or I could wait a few weeks for a computer. Tough. So that’s where I am now. Dell haven’t managed to answer ANY of the questions I’ve put to them, and they’re quite happy that all is well in a transaction where they have taken payment for a computer exactly one MONTH before they reckon they’ll deliver one. This international multi-billion dollar company, which can affect the GDP of countries by virtue of its choices about where to work, is apparently “unable” to get a computer to a customer from its retail operation. There apparently isn’t a ‘complaints department’ anywhere among Dell’s global operations, and the only page I’ve managed to find online that mentions complaints, at (can't insert link, not enough posts) has phone numbers which answer with a message saying “The number has changed, please ring…” followed by the same number I’d already used to get through to India. What a complete and utter shambles…

Add yet another 'me too' to the ever-growing list of people looking for that email address list - couldn't someone who has already received it post it here for everyone to see??!!

(a) You're not going to court, because they won't be stupid enough to issue a claim, (b) if they are that stupid, they won't win because the verbal contract you made with them about the purpose of the downpayment is just as legally binding as if it had been written down and sworn in blood - the only difference is that it's obviously easier to prove a contract when you've got a signed copy of it. And since you don't have a written copy, they don't have a written copy. Which means its your word against theirs. And, in this court, that will then come down to the balance of probabilities, and the balance of probabilities is that the upfront payment to you as a sole trader is more than likely to be money to cover the costs of buying materials. Which in short equals a win for you. © (with certain specific circumstances aside, and no your case isn't one of them) there is no reclamation of costs in the small claims arena. So in short, they won't take you, if they do take you they'll lose, and if they don't lose all you have to pay is the sum they're already claiming from you plus their court fee which for the sum you're talking about is about £40 I think. If you're still not convinced, pay them. And then immediately stop working for yourself, because you seriously ain't cut out for it...

Ah, apologies, I had the impression that they were chasing you not the other way round!

Woah! Back the hell up there - what are you talking about "next time"? You ain't lost this one yet! Just because this little mob decided they'd try the heavy card on you doesn't mean you just roll over for it - if nobody's mentioned what the deposit was for then they've got exactly the same job trying to say what it was for now as you have. Spend ten minutes writing out a polite reply stating that, as per the binding verbal agreement they made with you at the time, you've purchased the materials for the job from the deposit paid, and say that if they now wish to cancel the contract between you both then unfortunately they will forfeit the sum paid. Invite them to take whatever advice they feel they need to, but respectfully point out that in the circumstances you do not feel a repayment would be appropriate and if they feel otherwise you would be happy to defend their action.

That looks perfect, perplexity, thank you. I'm not looking for a watertight case for court (I've got enough on my hands with Dell as per another thread), merely an act to mention when asking for a refund of the relatively minor sum involved. This'll do lovely, cheers.

I'm obviously missing something because I can't see why you are working out how you might not have to pay them. Tell them that unless they can show where in the T&C they are allowed to change the currency you'll consider the contract null and void and not pay any further fees to them and invite them to sue if they're convinced they're right?!