Sky account referred to CCS

[Pritchette]

Hi,

 

Having a spot of bother trying to cancel my sky subscription.

 

We have switched to virgin due to cost and on the instruction of Virgin sent a letter to sky requesting that they close our account.

 

Sky phoned us, acknowledged receipt of the letter and instructed that they would be writing to us regarding this.

 

No letter arrvived until we got a reminder to pay our bill and that services were now suspended until we pay them £59.

 

We phoned up and explained that the account is cancelled and

 

after a long wait, were informed that they have not received our letter and that we would have to ring to cancel anyway!

 

My argument is that they clearly received our letter and never told us to ring them!

(Their message is still on my answer phone so I have proof we were 'misadvised').

 

They're refusing to budge though and insist we pay them this money!!

They reckon they've done nothing wrong and that it's our responsibility to check that we were informed correctly?!?!

 

Where do we stand legally with this?

 

Could we take them to the small claims court?

 

Many thanks in advance.

[scaffolder]

Did you sent the letter to Sky with recorded delivery , if so they would have to sign to receive it , if not you wouldn't have a leg to stand on .

 

Why didn't you just ring sky on the day and tell them you want to give 31 days notice to cancel , they would of haggled a bit and dangled a carrot to make you stay but a phone call would of been the better option

 

Sky do over charge for there package in my opinion but ring up and haggle !

[ims21]

Thread moved to the Digital TV Forum

[Pritchette]

Thanks for reply.

So the fact we have a recorded message of them acknowledging receipt will count for nothing? At no point during this process were we advised by them that we had to phone to cancel. Their response to our letter is that they will write to us, but there was no instruction to ring them. Besides which I don't fancy paying the extortionate fees to call their cancellation line.

We had previously called to see if they would price match Virgin, but they would not (this is what 11 years of custom gives you!).

[renegadeimp]

They TRY to force you to phone them, so they can beg/plead and offer a ton of stuff to get you to stay with them.

[Conniff]

Exactly as the post above. Virgin did that to me when I told them I was moving to BT.

 

 

Take a transcript of the message word for word and send that recorded delivery headed Official Complaint.

[IdaInFife]

Sky can only act on your letter if it has enough information on it like your sky password etc...

 

If there is lack of information to complete your request they try to call you to clarify this information and if they cannot contact you then send a letter asking you to call in.

 

I am only presuming this is the case with the information you have given.

 

Do you have a registered password on your sky account and was this given on the letter?

[NailPost]

I am having the same issues with sky about cancelling a subscription but in my case it is sky that don't have a leg to stand on as I did send them a written cancellation notice by signed for delivery and it they who are squirming while trying to extract cash from me. I would file a written formal complaint with sky sending it drecorded delivery and keeping the receipt and the printout from the royal mail website very carefully. I would also make doubly sure the message on your answerphone is secured by making a back up or something. Once received sky have eight weeks to resolve your complaint before it can go to the ombudsman. If he decides to investigate that's going to cost sky five or six times what they're claiming from you. You can also report sky to Ofcom. They will do nothing but record the complaints and if they see a pattern emerging - and they should given the traffic on complaints on sky's own community forum - might just tell sky to get their act together.

[Pritchette]

Thanks for your advice everyone. It really shouldn't be made so damned difficult to cancel a subscription. I will absolutely be taking my complaint as high as I can!

[kennythecelt]

I have previously contacted Sky and cancelled movies and sports. Better weather is coming and we can get out more.

 

My team is no longer in Europe, my team has won the league already and I honestly don't see why I should contribute to the massive income of the EPL and Championship when Sky give disproportionately les to Scottish footballer per subscriber. I only ever watched my team and am not interested in other sports.

 

Today, I called to say I was cancelling broadband and phone. That discussion and deleting virus protection and 3D which I don't have or need meant a saving of 50%. Just for a phone call and threat of leaving. I still have unlimited free calls and download, except 0845, which thankfully will cease shortly as that was a major [problem] and disgrace. Mobile numbers will be phoned on pay as you go with Tesco which has free calls to nominated numbers.

[IdaInFife]

kenny if your on skytalk anytime which is £5 for unlimited uk calls and do not call any internation calls you can swap this for anytime uk which is the same costs but includes 0845

[Pritchette]

Thanks in advance for reading!

 

I'll not go into the whole story,

 

but I have an account in dispute with Sky,

 

they say I owe £59,

 

I disagree.

 

I have requested Sky send me a letter of deadlock so that I can escalate my complaint.

 

They have chosen to ignore this request and have instead passed on all my details to CCS debt collection!!!

 

What can I do?

[renegadeimp]

Ignore the Silly DCA and email sky's CEO direct.

 

BSkyB

 

 

Mr Jeremy Darroch Chief Executive

 

Email jeremy.darroch@bskyb.com

Telephone 0207 705 3000

Website http://www.bskyb.com

Social Media T

 

Address Grant Way, Isleworth, TW7 5QD, UKM

Company Number 02247735C

 

 

The DCA has absolutely no legal rights at all. Whats happened is you talked to some min wage rep at sky and they thought they'd be smug and pass it to a DCA to deal with.

[Pritchette]

Magic! Thanks very much for this.

[dx100uk]

jut remember a DCA are NOT BAILIFFS

 

and have NO SUCH LEGAL POWERS.

 

check your CRA file has not been trashed mind!

 

dx

[dx100uk]

merged this with your old thread

 

please keep to one thread on the same issue

 

ta

dx

[Pritchette]

Just to update you all, I emailed Mr Darroch as instructed and I've just got off the phone having been told that the outstanding amount will be written off!!!

I'll get more excited once I have that in writing, but hey ho, it's a victory in my eyes!

Thanks again!!

[renegadeimp]

Well done Pity you had to go right to the top, but there ya go.

[Pritchette]

Yes it is a shame, but that sadly seems to be the only way these days.