In September 2007 I tried to upgrade my Tiscali dialup account to 2MB Broadband. This offer was for £14.99 and included line rental. I was told this would take two weeks. After waiting in vain for my broadband start up kit I called again only to learn that the order had actually never been put in.

Finally my broadband service was activated at the start of October. However, for the last four months I have been billed for both dialup AND broadband. When I first queried, I was given the excuse that my dialup was still being kept because of the email address linked to it. After further emails to Tiscali Billing I was assured that my dialup had been cancelled and a refund was being arranged.

A bill for January has arrived. It’s a bill for dial-up yet again.

In the last four months since I've signed up for Broadband, Tiscali have overbilled me £60 (four months of anytime Dialup). Isn't it basic common sense that when someone “upgrades” to another product, he wants the newer product instead of the old?

When I signed up for 2MB broadband line rental was promised as part of the deal. Yet recently I received an invoice for line rental from BT. When I called the Tiscali line rental department, it turns out that Tiscali was not handling my line rental.

Ever since signing up for Tiscali Broadband, I have continued to be billed for four months of Tiscali dialup, and I have not been given the free line rental I was led to believe. I have been overcharged £60.00, and lost out on £33.00 of line rental.

The customer call-service is incompetent. I have made numerous calls to the 0871 numbers for the same repeated requests to take off the dialup, and on some occasions the operators - I suspect, sensing a task beyond their capabilities - even hung up on me.

The broadband service works fine actually. I'm not a heavy user, and it works well for me. But the customer service is what really sucks. You pay an exorbitant per-minute rate, wait for a long time, and when you finally get through to get them to ask to sort out problems you had previously rung up about, you either get hung up on, or have to ring back again to find it never got done despite promises.

I notice that Tiscali has recently re-introduced the offer of broadband at £6.49 for three months then £12.49 thereafter, with a free wireless router. From my experience, my advice would be to take up this attractive offer if you wish, but remember that with Tiscali, if there are problems, you will have to keep ringing their expensive 0871 number in the HOPE of getting things resolved. In addition, their customer service department is so fragmented, you can't just speak to one person if you have a complex problem, you have to move from one department to another. (I got transferred from Billing to Line Rental and back to Billing again.) And if Tiscali are desperate enough to flog you that offer to entice you to sign up, it must be because people are leaving in droves.

EDIT UPDATE: Tiscali informed me that they would credit my account with the dialup refund. I cancelled my Direct Debit for this month because I didn't want them billing me yet again, bearing in mind the amount refunded would more than cover the Direct Debit. They responded by cutting off my broadband service. Tiscali are slow to refund you what they owe you, but the moment you threaten not to pay, the Billing Department is quick to get on the case! Incredible!

Yeah i can see whats happened. As you wanted to keep your dial up address the account probably wasn't downgraded to pay of you go and just kept at the regular tariff. Of course tiscali are liable to refund if you have a dial up &broadband service that overlaps. And that usually results in it being esclated to the finance department who usually take around 5-7 working days to apply the credit, but it would of probably been a credit that was applied to your account so it wouldn't show until the following invoice came out. The free line rental may not be availabel in your area so i would advise you to check the tiscali.co.uk website for that. as unless you line is MPF the line rental order would just get stuck which caused so much hassel it's unreal the amount of customers orders that get stuck as they cannot get the service it just leaves alot of angry customers. If you can't get free line rental they can always offer it at £8.25. Unfortunatly the case is with tiscali fi you cancel your direct debit your put into a suspension area until you pay off the full outstanding balance or re-instate your DD. But yes cust services are trying to do their best although i can say some do not have a clue in hell.

I didn't want to keep the dial-up address. I told them to cancel it. The customer service person assured me it would be done. It wasn't. It took three attempts to get it cancelled.

I checked that free line rental was available in my area on the Tiscali website before I applied for broadband.

In the past week I received a Feb bill from Tiscali. They refunded me what amounted to two months' dialup, and there was an extra £6.99 for something - I wish I know what it was, because all it says on the bill is "£38.18 - amendment by Customer Service". I wish they'd itemise things instead of using such vague terms.

When I last contacted them in January the customer service staff also said that the bill for Feb had already been generated, and there was going to be a further refund made in the next bill (i.e. March). Whether or not I get the rest of the amount owed remains to be seen.

In typical Tiscali fashion, I also received a letter dated 31st January, saying "Your line transfer will take place on 28 January". Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but that's not the way to run a business.

To its credit, though, the line transfer was seamless and everything works fine.

TIscali sent me a letter dated 28 January 2008 in which they promised to refund me 38.18 - what the breakdown is, I don't know, because it's all lumped in a sum classed as "customer service adjustment".

The letter mentioned that the money owed would be debited into my account within 28 days - yet I still have not received it.

Back to its usual tricks again.

A reply I got to my email complaint:

Dear Sir,

Thank you for contacting Tiscali Customer Support.

Firstly, I would like to apologise for the delay in answering this email.

As per checking our notes here, regarding the credit that is shown in your January 22 bill. There is a deduction in your February bill and kindly please check your upcoming bill for the other refunds and email us back if it still does not materialise. Please bear with us then.

You can view all of your invoices by visiting the My account area of the Tiscali website at the following link:

http://www.tiscali.co.uk/members/myaccount/manage/

You can then access your billing information by clicking on View your bill

If you require a hard copy of your invoice, please call our Billing and Care team on 0871 222 3311.

Lines are open everyday from 8am to midnight and calls are charged at 10p per minute.

I also apologise for any inconvenience it may have caused you.

Kind regards,

[Staff name]

This reply was not satisfactory to me. My February bill, which I had already checked before I emailed them, showed a normal debit for broadband - no adjustments made on account of them owing me money. In any case, they'd previously said the money they owed me would be credited straight to my bank account, not used to adjust future bills.

I emailed them to let them know.

Dear Sir or Madam,

I refer to the response below given to me by one of your customer service staff.

A few weeks ago I wrote to Tiscali because I was being charged for broadband and dialup even though I had upgraded to broadband. My final dialup bill, dated 22 January 2008, showed that I would be refunded £38.18, and that a refund would be processed within 28 days. It is already more than 6 weeks and I still have not been refunded.

Your customer service staff, [name included], advised me to check my February bill. I did check my bill dated 06 Feb 2008 before I emailed the first time. I've just been billed for the broadband, and no adjustments have been made. In fact, the bill has no relevance to the matter at all - I refer you to what it says on my final dialup bill:

"If the above balance is in credit and an amount is owed to you, you need not take any action as a refund for this amount will be processed within 28 days."

So please don't fob me off with another meaningless reply, meaningless promises, and hoping to stall for time - that, unfortunately, has been my experience with Tiscali Customer Service. Could you please explain to me why I have to keep chasing you up for £38.18 - money which Tiscali should never have debited from my account in the first place!

Thank you.

This was their (same day) reply.

Thank you for contacting Tiscali Customer Care.

I have escalated your issue regarding being charged for broadband and dial-up even though you have upgraded to broadband to our Finance and Administration Department.

They will investigate the matter and be in touch with you within the next 48 hours.

For you information this is the Reference No. XXXXXXXXXXXX should you need to contact us about this matter in the future.

If you would like an update on the progress of you [sic] issue, please contact our Technical Support Desk.

They can be contacted on 0871 222 3311, line are open 24 hours 7 days per week and calls are charged at 10p per minute.

If you have any further queries, you can find all of Tiscali's contact details on the following link:


Kind regards,

[staff name]

48 hours? I wouldn't raise my hopes. But let's wait and see.

After reading about the experience from the above blog, I realise I'll still have to do a bit more calling up and chasing.

We should all set up blogs like this, so that googling Tiscali instantly brings up a blog with a complaint against it.

Tiscali didn't get back to me as promised. But don't we all know them to be all talk and no action!

Could anyone enlighten me on whether they managed to get a refund for money owing from Tiscali, and if so, how long it took, and any actions you suggest I should take.

Thanks.

Note: The title of this post has been moderated. Please read the moneysupermarket.com User Community Standards and Terms of Service. Cheers.

To the moderator: I'm sorry I contravened the user community standards - thanks for amending the title on my behalf.

I emailed a complaint to Mary and Jody and received both an email and a call - surprise! - from a high level complaints executive.

Apart from the usual apologies, he mentioned I would receive a 50 pound cheque "in due course".

How can a company that has problems paying me 38.18 pounds within 28 days pay me 50?

"In due course" is too vague. So I've written back to ask him to ask him to give me a date by which time I'll receive a cheque.

Note: The title of this post has been moderated. Please read the moneysupermarket.com User Community Standards and Terms of Service. Cheers.

I did a search for "high level complaints executive" through google and found the following addresses:

Like I mentioned previously, emailing the first two addresses brought about an email as well as a call from a high level complaints executive - he even left his phone number, an (0207) one, would you believe it.

My advice if you have a complaint, would be to email it to all those mentioned above. It seemed to get me out of the terrible loop of Tiscali call centres and all that - whether or not it's the start of a new loop, we'll have to wait and see.

Note: The title of this post has been moderated. Please read the moneysupermarket.com User Community Standards and Terms of Service. Cheers.

http://www.uswitch.com/Broadband/Customer-Satisfaction.html?ref=email_quidsin_uswitch_18march08

Tiscali - second for billing?

They billed me for dialup I didn't use, owed me money and still haven't repaid it back.

If they still don't cough up I shall have to list the High Level Complaints number on this forum.