topic Re: New customer, double billed! in Plusnet Feedback

New customer, double billed!

Gafadadevil — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:23:29 GMT

As a new customer I was double billed for the first months payments.
I contacted customer services on March 11th and was assured a refund would be issued, I haven't receive it yet.
Tickets have been raised and unanswered.
How long does it take for Plusnet to rectify it's mistakes?

Re: New customer, double billed!

orbrey — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 16:42:42 GMT

Hi there,
I can see that your refund was issued on the 19th, so it should be coming through into your account shortly. I'm sorry for the delay.

Re: New customer, double billed!

jelv — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 17:22:05 GMT

Quote from: Gafadadevil
I contacted customer services on March 11th and was assured a refund would be issued, I haven't receive it yet.

Quote from: Matt
I can see that your refund was issued on the 19th, so it should be coming through into your account shortly. I'm sorry for the delay.

Why the delay?

Re: New customer, double billed!

orbrey — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 17:27:50 GMT

There were a number of refunds so they were done by script (as part of the fix for this problem), which needed development and testing.

Re: New customer, double billed!

pierre_pierre — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:03:55 GMT

that answer is disgusting,

Re: New customer, double billed!

Gafadadevil — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:39:05 GMT

I agree with pierre_pierre.
It shouldnt take 10-14 working days to return money you have stolen from peoples accounts, it should returned in a matter of a few days, other companies can do refunds within 3-4 days, I guess Plusnet just doesn't care and likes to help themselves to their customers' money and delay repaying it as long as possible. Do you pay your customers compensation for this unauthorised borrowing the same as they would have to do?

Re: New customer, double billed!

win7xp — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:44:48 GMT

Quote from: Matt
There were a number of refunds so they were done by script (as part of the fix for this problem), which needed development and testing.

I wonder how many refunds exactly - and more to the point how many people out there don't regularly check their bank statements and could be blisfully unaware that PN are borrowing their money.

Re: New customer, double billed!

shutter — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 18:56:49 GMT

Quote from: Matt
There were a number of refunds so they were done by script (as part of the fix for this problem), which needed development and testing.

Somehow, I feel this is an insult to the customer......
Firstly, ..... Because he should NEVER have been double billed in the first place..... PlusNet has been in this business for long enough now to know how to bill customers PROPERLY..... ONCE>>>> AND ONLY ONCE>
Secondly....... because he had to wait for EIGHT DAYS before any action was taken on his ticket
Thirdly....... Because of the first reply by Matt Taylor..... ending with ".....I`m sorry for the delay" (so that`s ok then,......NOT)
Fourthly .... Because of the second reply by Matt Taylor, suggesting that there were SO MANY REFUNDS TO ACTION... (There were a number of refunds so they were done by script) and what does "done by script" mean? By Hand? Not computerised? therefore the customer must wait while we sort ourselves out....
Fifthly ..... Because of the last part of the second reply by Matt Taylor......" (as part of the fix for this problem), which needed development and testing."

Why should the customer`s refund(s) be part of "development and testing"..... see my earlier remark about how long PlusNet have been in business....
By now, none of the STUPID MISTAKES that have been occurring recently should ever have happened. and then be compounded by such comments/remarks/excuses as put out in response to the complaint....
Disgusting is too polite a word to use....

Re: New customer, double billed!

win7xp — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:56:11 GMT

me thinks the lid is well and truly off the can of worms

Re: New customer, double billed!

Chris — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 20:14:17 GMT

I think we all agree that incorrect billing is something that nobody wants to happen, however there was a problem identified where some customers were being charged for their first month's subscription as an initial fee and then once the service went active, another invoice raised for the same period. The problem cleanup was performed in batches, however as there was a ticket raised on the 11th this refund should have taken place manually without waiting for the script. I'm very sorry this didn't happen, the ticket is currently open with a member of our customer service department so I'll speak to them and their manager to see why the refund wasn't instigated when they picked up the ticket.
We understand that some other companies may be able to refund direct debit payments faster that we can, unfortunately at the moment it does take 7-10 working days to clear.
@Gafadadevil I'd be happy to get someone to give you a call tomorrow, or call you myself to try and see if we can help resolve this problem for you.
Once again I'm very sorry for the problem you've experienced and hope that we can make things right for you.

Re: New customer, double billed!

Gafadadevil — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 22:23:52 GMT

Thanks Chris, the only resolution needed to to quickly refund the money.
Why can't you use a quicker method of refunding as it usually only takes 2-3 days for a debit card payment to clear?
Surely you should be prioritising these refunds and using the fasted method available to give your customers their money back.
What would have happened if I didn't notice and report the error?
It has already been 10 working days since I reported the error and was told I would be refunded, the actual overpayment was made the previous day (10th March).
Why does it take Plusnet so long to fix their mistakes?

Re: New customer, double billed!

Fletch — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 22:56:29 GMT

I want to make a couple of comments on this thread, and try and provide some assurances that we are working to improve our billing platform. We have incorrectly billed a number of customers which has been caused by a series of implementation mistakes which goes back to February 2009 when we updated our contracts system, and following the implementation of pricing by markets (i.e. Market 1&2 and Market 3 pricing), followed by an update in late November to handle our new 10 day cancellation policy. We have had a team working within the engineering department on the issues since mid January.
We have a number of scenarios where we have identified incorrect billing can occur if processes are followed incorrectly. To be clear this doesn't happen in all cases:
- House Move from Market 1&2 to Market 3 or vice versa.
- WLR Activation Events which occur before a Broadband order and across a billing period resulting in double billing of initial fees.
- Account changes which results in a change to subscription components (ie. a move to ADSL2+)
- Creation of Subscription components (Broadband, or WLR) in the past.
- Account changes to WLR which result in contracts being
Where we have identified that incorrect billing has taken place we have already started the process of issuing refunds to these customers proactively.
I know sorry isn't good enough, but I wanted to provide assurances that this does have visibility, and critically a good understanding of the issues within the management team, and my team is focused on addressing the issues and improving the system so that manual process errors do not cause double billing, and the system has safe gaurds in place to address. The safe guards have been in place for about 8 days now and we have seen a considerable reduction in incorrect billing, and I'm confident that we will address the remaining issues.
Finally, I will go and investigate whether we can refund quicker than we are doing at the moment, as I agree this shouldn't be the case.
Thanks
Fletch

Re: New customer, double billed!

LiamM — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 00:49:24 GMT

Hey Fletch,
Thanks for the post!
Good to see traction in the billing department and I know we've been discussing this (with yourself and PN) in PUG for some time. Something you mentioned which I agree with - I think refunds are a key point of dis-sat right now and just make the whole situation a worse on the odd occasion that billing mistakes do happen. As far as I know BACS refunds (sometimes known as Direct Debit refunds although that's not really the case) can take quite some time to process due to 'process' issues internally and if a customer has been mis-billed by PN it's quite right that they expect no less than an immediate refund. I understand it's because they only get 'looked at' every x days - but really, if there are billing issues happening they should be looked at and actioned upon almost daily.

Re: New customer, double billed!

jelv — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 09:17:40 GMT

A measure of a company is not just how well they avoid problems but how they deal with problems when they occur; in that respect Plusnet's response to people complaining about being over-charged is a total an utter failure.
There are two aspects to the problem. The first is that it takes too long for the Plusnet internal processes - they should set a target of the money being back in the users accounts within 3 or 4 days of the user complaining.
The second aspect is the artificial delay that occurs when Plusnet insist on waiting for confirmation that Direct Debit has succeeded before they will even start the process of issuing a refund. So the customer gets the advance notice of the Direct Debit and within minutes of receiving the email rings up, it's already too late to stop/amend the DD. So there is then 3 days wait before the money is taken from the user's account, then a number of days before PN get confirmation that the DD succeeded - by which time the user has been able to see that the money has gone from their account some days ago, then the wait for the Plusnet processes. It wouldn't surprise me if users never get their money back within a fortnight of making that initial call.
I know the bean counters are scared of issuing a refund against a DD that fails, but the risks of that have to be balanced against totally pissing off a far higher number of users. At the moment the balance is totally wrong.

Re: New customer, double billed!

shutter — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:38:53 GMT

On the same subject as Jelv..... another factor in this, is the "quality" of the responses given to customers who have been wrongly accounted by PlusNet....
Judging by the tone of the responses on this thread alone, (check out other threads of similar complaint) it comes across as though it is the customer`s fault that they have been wrongly accounted by PlusNet, and PlusNet has to re-organise it`s accounting department just to accomodate an inconsiderate customer.....
( or as Matt Taylor said in his response.... )

Quote

There were a number of refunds so they were done by script (as part of the fix for this problem), which needed development and testing.

Fletch has "owned up" to the fact there are several sources of problems, WITHIN PLUSNET ACCOUNTING DEPARTMENT, that can cause overcharging..... and has also admitted that they have known about these problems for over a year

Quote

We have incorrectly billed a number of customers which has been caused by a series of implementation mistakes which goes back to February 2009

Why?
How long does it take to change an accounting system, into one that works properly?
Who knows how accurate the "end of financial year" accounts for PlusNet are?
If I were the chief accountant, I would be seriously worried about these problems, and possibly, seriously worried about my future employment prospects with PlusNet.....

Re: New customer, double billed!

xpcomputers — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:57:29 GMT

Of course the other aspect of the problem is that there isn't a 14 day notice before the direct debit overcharge is claimed in the beginning.
Sorting out getting money back to people quickly, when wrongly taken, is very important... but so would be minimising the number of times money is wrongly taken in the first place! That obviously involves fixing the safeguard checks which prevent billing problems occurring in future, which is the most crucial aspect, which the team have been looking at and have made good progress on - so that part is in hand. But even with all the checks in the world and a perfect system at your end, there will still be occasional times when a bill is wrong (because supplier data is up the creek, or someone presses the wrong button etc)... and that is why you also need to lengthen the direct debit notice to allow a good time for the customer to check the bill, report any mistake to you, and get the rectified long before the money even leaves their account.
Then for the very few times something goes unnoticed in the future, and needs a refund issuing, then improving the speed of refund aspects will make a massive difference to the frustration and anger levels of the customers involved.
As I know from PUG, this is being taken seriously by Plusnet, at the highest levels of management. I hope in due course we will have good news on all these fronts, and that you are tackling it in a holistic manner. I think it is only when this has been tackled on all those fronts will the issue have finally been put to bed.
Glad to hear you are proactively hunting out over-charged customers to issue them refunds even if they haven't noticed this themselves.
Mike

Re: New customer, double billed!

Fletch — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:53:48 GMT

I want to be really clear that when we have made a mistake it is no way the customers fault, and I agree we are taking too long to process requests for refunds. Having reviewed this today with the team we do have an internal lag which means it can take upto 76 hours before the request is submitted to the bank for processing. I'm going to look at how we can change this quickly and ensure that we process refunds quickly and provide confidence to our customers. I'll also look at whether we can issue a refund before the DD has been collected as I see the point your making here Jelv. I'll provide an update on this by the middle of next week.
@shutter To be clear we have been aware of the billing issues since late December following the change in November which caused and increase in the number of complaints. We kicked off a review following the VAT change which we completed in January to understand the issues, and we have been actively refunding customers in February and March who we know who have been effected.
I'm absolutely committed to resolving the issues and improving the perceptions of our billing processes.
Thanks,
F

Re: New customer, double billed!

Be3G — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:56:31 GMT

Quote from: xpcomputers
you also need to lengthen the direct debit notice to allow a good time for the customer to check the bill, report any mistake to you, and get the rectified long before the money even leaves their account.

Bingo. If Plusnet actually had a reasonable period before they started taking a DD payment then I know that my level of frustration over the various refunds I've had to claim would have been reduced. I'm 99% certain I've said this before, but I'll say it again: giving the customer no notice period whatsoever, in my opinion, smacks of Plusnet putting their bank account first and the customer second – and considering the prevalence of billing issues over the last year or two, it's frankly quite rude.
So yes, I think amending the notice period is something that needs to be considered with the utmost priority.

Re: New customer, double billed!

shutter — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:05:37 GMT

@ Fletch....
Thank you for your response.... I am glad that you are aware of problems, and doing something about it..... however two quotes seem to dispel this ...

Quote
We have incorrectly billed a number of customers which has been caused by a series of implementation mistakes which goes back to February 2009

In a previous post, I asked the question "why" ..... but somehow that got ignored.....

Quote

@shutter To be clear we have been aware of the billing issues since late December following the change in November which caused and increase in the number of complaints.

SO .... although you are now claiming to be doing something..... it seems from the above quotes that you have been aware of mistakes as far back as Feb 2009, yet you have only been aware of the billing issuese since late December.......... and are just getting around to fixing them.....
As Be3g says

Quote

giving the customer no notice period whatsoever, in my opinion, smacks of Plusnet putting their bank account first and the customer second – and considering the prevalence of billing issues over the last year or two, it's frankly quite rude.

the point about PlusNet putting "their" bank account first seems to directly affect the customer, much more than it would PlusNet.....
is the quantity of "incorrect billing" mistakes, so huge, that it would not be feasible for a suitably qualified, senior staff member, to sit at a keyboard, for a couple of days, and initiate the refunds by direct input, rather than "let`s sort out the software problems first, and the refunds will eventually be disbursed"..... This is money which rightfully belongs in the customer`s account...... not PlusNet`s.... as you have already admitted.....

Re: New customer, double billed!

pjmarsh — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:06:18 GMT

At what point did Fletch say they knew about the problems back in Feb 09? He said the problems started due to a change in Feb 09, but that doesn't mean they knew about the problems then.
Phil