How to potentially leave your contract penalty free

[Anonymous]

Now, I'm not saying this is guarenteed or anything but it's worth a go for reasons I'll explain later so please no comments regarding whether it will or won't work. It's better than doing nothing.

This link

http://www.saga.co.uk/money/news/2014/january/what-can-you-do-if-your-mobile-phone-bill-has-suddenly...

Explains all the necessary actions you need to take to challenge the 2.7% increase in pay monthly tarriffs.

Please read the whole link as there is different advice for different situations.

For information I have complained to O2 and it has been rejected HOWEVER it has beeen taken up by the Communications Ombudsman so fingers crossed.

Now, because of this. This has cost O2 £300.00 which is by far more than they will get from me from the price hike so even if the Ombudsman rejects it it has still cost O2 more than their 2.7% hike that they'll get from me so it won't be all bad.

Like I've said so far as it's a new increase and obviously rulings (if any) will not have come into force yet so it's a trial at the moment.

There are various ways you can pursue this and all is explained in the link however some are free and some are paid. The route you choose is your choice, I personally have chosen the free route.

Like I said please read all the link first and follow the advice to the letter and we should (Fingers Crossed) get somewhere with this.

Good Luck

Gillsfankev

Credit for discovering this goes to member BROWNI

[adamtemp64]

8 weeks or sooner if o2 issue a deadlock letter

[davethorp]

Well O2 didn't even bother responding to any of the points raised in the email I sent last night, such is their contempt for their customers. They've issued a final response. Drafting email to the ombudsman now

[Anonymous]

Good that's another £300 they will lose

[Anonymous]

Ombudsman have an online form to fill in. Its easy

[perksie]

It might just be enough to make them look at this again.

[Anonymous]

As it costs O2 every time the ombudsman takes a case up it might just.

[Anonymous]

Please remember before going to the Ombudsman Service you MUST go through o2's complaints review service or your complaint won't even be considered.

On the Which weblink I have put full details on there for anyone wishing to go through this route who isn't seeing our threads on the Community.

[a_hcir]

Anyone have any success yet?  I've recieved a boilerplate e-mail with a frankly laughable section stating why my contract is such great value, and I've asked them to confirm that they aren't going to do anything before I take it to the ombudsman.

I've even been quite easy on o2.  I haven't asked to be released from my contract, just for them to fix the price as initially agreed for 24 months.  But if they want to play hardball over £32 (this price includes next year's anticipated rise) then I have no problem with taking it to the ombudsman who will cost them far more than that amount.

FYI, this was my response to their boilerplate mail telling me about their great value "extras":

---

@I wrote:

I would also like to mention that I found this part of your e-mail insulting:

"we continue to offer extras such as O2 Priority Moments, O2 Gurus, O2 Wifi and O2 Recycle."

1. o2 Priority Moments is a promotional tool designed to get us to spend more with your retail partners.  Equivalents to most deals can be found on hotukdeals.com or by downloading vouchers from the retail partner website.  It is certainly not a great reason to have an o2 contract.

2. o2 Gurus is just another name for level 2 support.  I would hardly count it as an "extra".

3. o2 Wifi just piggybacks on free wifi offered by many businesses and is not part of our subscription - in fact, it is free to non-o2 customers.

4. o2 Recycle is hardly an extra - just a way of selling old phones to make money - making yourselves a nice profit in the process.

About the only useful extra, which you've completely failed to mention, is Tu Go and most of the time that doesn't work properly! 

---

[MI5]

It was never a "fixed price".
Where did you see that written anywhere?

[a_hcir]

---

@MI5 wrote:
It was never a "fixed price".
Where did you see that written anywhere?

---

This has been covered about a trillion times on this forum, if I wasn't so full of violent acidic rage I wouldn't reply because it's covered so much, but I'll reiterate because I want you to believe and become one of us:  o2 and their partners misrepresent these contracts as fixed price, fixed term contracts.  If you disagree because you are someone who fastidiously reads every bit of small print ever, that's your opinion, but in the opinion of the majority it's a slimy way of doing business and we'll seek redress as it inner right, duck.  If they don't want to fix their price, they should say so at the point of sale (e.g. "£20 per month, rising at RPI (currently 2.7%) each April, 24 month contract" instead of "£20 per month, 24 month contract").