Dear Friends, I need advice as to what to do to get back my money from Orange phones. I had a 12 mths Contract with Orange after which I phoned them in Feb 2010 to cancel my contract. We took another new contract with them for my daughter at the same address. After this I forgot about it and things carried on as normal. One year later, in Feb 2011, I realised that Orange was still deducting monthly payments by Direct Debit for my old Contract which we cancelled in Feb 2010. So I wrote to them and asked them for a full refund of the 12 mths overpayments as the phone has been cancelled and not used since. They have agreed that we called in Feb 2010 to cancel the contract and also have not used the phone number since then. They have refunded only 3 mths money and will not refund the rest. They say that they had sent us a PAC no. and as we did not use it for another connection, the contract was continued and money continued to be taken out by direct debit. It is our fault that we did not use the PAC no. We were unaware of this and did not receive any PAC no. My fault was that I should have cancelled the Direct Debit then, but I was told to do so after the final bill is settled and after that I just forgot. Please can someone advise me how can I get my remaining money back from Orange? Is going to 'Small claims court' an option? Or any other? If i take legal action who is the person from Orange to be implicated? Many Thanks. Probe:-( 31.7.11

Hi all, Some history: I have student loans from 98 to 2001. I was paying my student loan in the UK via pay as you earn system for 3 years. No problems. In 2004 I moved overseas and continued to get paid in the UK for almost a year, again no issues. I then moved overseas fully and completed the overseas assessment form shortly after. This was assessed at a set monthly rate, I guess based on my overseas income converted into pounds at that time. My only issues with this was that the only convenient way of paying it back is using my overseas master card and paying their fees plus an additional 2% from the student loans company. Also I was under the impression as the student loan was taken at source in the UK that it was from pre taxed money. Can someone please confirm this? I spoke with HRMC at the time and they said even if it was the case, as I was paying no UK tax due to no income I can't do anything about it, I'd just like to know if I'm paying a lot more than I would do in the UK. Now the issue: A year or 2 after me diligently calling to pay, and eventually them getting their act together enough to process payments online, the loan they sent a further assessment form. I believe I skipped filling it for a year, they then threatened arrears against a default rate, so I filled it. My salary hadn't changed much, just the overtime and exchange rate. But they came back saying my monthly payment was to be almost tripled. My understanding of this increase was because the exchange rate plummeted on the weak pound and the percentage they claim increases with the more you earn. So we discussed that this was unreasonable and they agreed I could continue to pay what I used to pay and a note would be added to my file. They wouldn't send me any written agreement. Now I'm getting already outdated letters from a Smith Lawson & Company (very clever name) saying they're acting for a client and wanting the difference between the assessed rate plus some admin charges otherwise legal action will be taken. They even include small print that they are the Student loan company, very nice of them. They haven't sent me a balance for a while so it was nice to hear from them. So my questions are, do I have a leg to stand on for these fees? Can they start legal proceedings on me? Also is there anyway of getting the amounts I have over paid back off the loan? e.g. the credit card fees and potentially the tax. Any advice would be much appreciated.