There are so many threads and posts about inaccurate billing and overcharging that it seems pointless to consider adding my comments to an existing discussion and more sensible to start a new topic.
I (or rather we...) have two accounts with Plusnet. Having been loyal customers for over a decade at our main home, when we inherited the late in-laws' flat a couple of years ago to use as a second home/place to stay for weekends and when visiting relatives in the area, we decided to sign up with Plusnet for both broadband and home phone there.
All went well initially, although when the initial contract ran out without any renewal-reminder we were belatedly shocked to find ourselves being billed at outrageous "out-of-contract" rates. That galvanised us into agreeing a new 12-month contract starting 18 Oct 2018 with annual line rental saver paid in advance and a discounted monthly rate for broadband and phone of £2.99 per month.
We got an email confirming the new contract and the advance line rental payment, and thought no more about it. The flat and contract are in my wife's name and she rarely if ever checks her Plusnet webmail inbox or the online customer centre, and seldom examines the bank statements.
Meanwhile like so many others we've had a bit of a saga over the billing for our "main" Plusnet account because of the widely-reported accounts system failures. I raised tickets, and posted in the forum, and thankfully after some months and with intervention and follow up by Ollie and others in the Customer Service team, that mess was eventually (touch wood) sorted out. Sigh of relief.
We didn't think to check our other Plusnet account until - by chance - we encountered a technical problem with the phone line at the flat. That required a call to the tech team and the intervention of a BT Openreach engineer (it was a problem at the exchange or somewhere else), and it seems to have been sorted. However..... because of that, we logged into that account in the Member Centre to check on the progress report with that 'ticket', and while doing so decided to check the account details and the billing. What a mess! We couldn't make sense of it. We appeared to be being charged and billed at £10.99 per month, but yet were "in credit" by over £100. Smoke and mirrors, or what?
Long story short: I called CS and spoke to Hau Nguyen (who has raised a ticket #190898379). He confirmed that, yes, the contract agreed from October 2018 was for 12 months, with Line Rental Saver at £197.88 and broadband plus home phone at a (discounted) £2.99 per month. However, it appears that the accounts department have screwed up three times over in managing this:
i) the payment of £197.88 back in October 2018 was not processed as payment for 12 months advance line rental (even though we got an email receipt saying it was). Instead it had simply been entered as a 'credit' on the account;
ii) the agreed monthly rate of £2.99 (a discount of £8 per month) had not been recorded or applied at all; and instead.....
iii) the monthly charges had been debited for the last eight months at the incorrect full (non-contract) rate of £10.99 per month, thus gradually drawing down the (apparent) credit - which now stands at about £106...
You couldn't make it up. Whatever could have been done wrong seems to have been done wrong. So now sorting out this tangle is likely to take the accounts department, and Customer Service staff, a whole lot more extra time.
I was, and am, sympathetic over Plusnet's reported computer-system technical issues - if this is indeed where the problem lies. But that has been the stock excuse for oh, perhaps a year now? I do worry that in this case - and perhaps others - the problem may not be with the IT machinery, but with the people who actually input the essential information and figures. I hope I'm wrong, but I will l be paying close attention to the follow-up reporting on the question that has now been opened on the administration of this account, to find out whether Plusnet owes us a refund, or whether we will now have to pay some arrears of the monthly charge.
If this was an end-of-term school report on Plusnet's accounts-management, the verdict would have to be "...Could do (a lot) better"!
