I'm going to be charged extra fees due to faulty website and payment verification window?

[#1]

Hello. I have an extremely urgent issue.

My direct debit was due to come off on the 14th of March, however, the payment failed because I had unexpectedly had less money in my account prior to being paid. The next day, I attempted to pay on the website and I've just had constant problems ever since.

From the start, I was basically unable to access the website. I had to try countless times over the course of an hour or so just to get into my account, then I was repeatedly unable to access features of the website, including the option to pay my bill, occasionally being suddenly completely unable to access the website. I tried different browsers and deleting my browser history, but I am still having these problems.

Eventually, I did manage to get into the payment screen, I put in my details and agreed to pay... When it got to the security verification window, the website suddenly cut to a notification that the plusnet website had failed to load...

I checked my online bank account, the payment was pending, available funds had been deducted. Over the following week I received repeated redirections to a ransom note notifying me that I hadn't paid my bill and that I would be automatically charged £5.76 and also a £7.50 administration fee. I had remained hopeful that eventually the transaction would clear and everything would be fine.

At some point in the process the transaction seems to have failed. I was repeatedly unable to access the plusnet website over the following days. I still cannot access the billing section to even possibly try to figure out why the payment has failed, but I imagine it is because of the issue with the verification screen, where it suddenly lost all connection to the plusnet website.

I managed to get back into the payment window and tried the same payment process again.... Only for the exact same thing to happen again.

So now I have a pending transaction in my bank account statement and available funds withdrawn, meaning I no longer have the accessible funds in my account to pay my bill until that transaction is processed, which will likely fail, as it also crashed during the verification screen and I'm being told by plusnet that if I don't successfully pay within the next four days, then I'm going to be charged £13.26................

I'm really not impressed by this. I don't intend to pay additional charges, as I would argue that this issue is clearly not my fault, apart from my initial mistake of not having funds to pay the direct debit, although it should have been an easy problem to correct.

Basically, I just want some assurances that this will be dealt with before I am charged. Regardless, I have decided I am going to cancel my service, due to the stress this is causing.


Thanks for taking the time to deal with my issue, I look forward to hearing back with a solution.

[#2]

Hi @watifeir, thanks for your post and welcome the Community!

We're sorry to hear that you're now planning on leaving us, regardless of the outcome of the situation.

On checking the account, we've received no prior contact from you either on the phone or online in relation to this issue. We're unfortunately unable to resolve an issue if we don't know that it's ongoing.

We can assure you though, that wherever erroneous charges have been applied, we'll waive them and I'm going to personally monitor your account to ensure that any late payment fees are dealt with as soon as they generate.

Please let me know here if you need any further assistance in the meantime.

[#3]

Hello @OskarPapa 

Thank you for your assurance that I don't have to worry about these additional charges and for personally seeing to my query.

For whatever reason, I can now access the member centre again with absolutely no issues, however, the option to pay my bill seems to have disappeared entirely. I have seen other posts where service users have had similar issues and I am wondering if it is maybe a problem specifically related to the limits incurred by failing to make a payment on time...
If people are unable to pay their bill solely due to limits on their internet service, placed for not paying it... A very frustrating scenario for someone to find themselves in.

Although the option to pay has vanished from the member centre, the money I have allotted to pay my bill is still tied up in the pending transaction I mentioned in my original post, and I would not be able to do so for 3-5 business days, until the pending transaction has fully resolved.

I am wondering if there is an option to simply add this month's payment on to next month's direct debit? I only request this as I've already attempted to pay twice which has resulted in this issue both times. If it were to happen a third time, I think you can agree that it wouldn't be ideal for anybody.

~Daniel

[#4]

Hi @watifeir

Thanks for getting in touch and I am sorry if you have had issues getting online to pay your invoice.

I have responded via a ticket on your account with further detail on your issue. You can view these details here
If you have any questions feel free to get in touch