Arrears shown on PAYG account. All enquiries hit dead end

[vodkaphonejill]

I have a PAYG a/c, with a Big Value Bundle. Prior to that I had an ordinary PAYG.

My dashboard tells me I am in arrears of £452.91, and it went up by £50 on the day I started making enquiries about it. I've tried Customer Service several times, Complaints 3 times, and visited my local Vodafone shop twice. Everyone says I don't owe anything, but the dashboard clearly states that my "account is in arrears" and when I click through to "make payment" the debt is given as £452.91. No one can explain it. They've checked back to the beginning of my account in 2014, checked both my postal addresses - they are adamant I do NOT owe money - I agree - but the website says I do. I cannot ignore this but Vodafone don't seem interested and won't give me any explanation. I tried online chat but it never loads on my browser (tried Firefox and Chrome). The phone lines have been uniformly appalling - mostly ending with cut offs, and no one has followed up despite promising to do so. No one can answer the question "Why does my dashboard say I am £452.91 in arrears on a PAYG account?"

[MarkD]

Hi @vodkaphonejill, we understand your frustration if you've only ever held a Pay as you Go account with us. When you sign into the My Vodafone online account, is the number showing your correct mobile number? Have you ever received any postal letters or e-mails from us about a balance to pay? 

[vodkaphonejill]

thank you for your reply. I've been through all these questions NUMEROUS times. I've supplied screenshots.

No one at Vodafone can find out why this appears on my dashboard, Nor do they keep their promises to follow up. 

Yes, it's the correct number, no I haven't received any requests for payment,

EXCEPT FOR THE ONE I SEE EVERY TIME I OPEN THE DASHBOARD TELLING ME I AM IN ARREARS TO THE TUNE OF £452.91. I don't know anyone who would ignore a message like that, do you? I've been through all layers of customer service, spoken to 3 people at the Complaints number, and asked for a deadlock letter or escalation. I've done all that again at the Vodafone shop and they saw the messages themselves. Nothing happens, although promises get made and not kept. Except I get asked a few more repeated questions I have answered numerous times. Why does my dashboard say this? Why don't Vodafone do anything about it? Why can't Vodafone sort out their own web portal?

[MarkD]

Thanks for getting back to us @vodkaphonejill. If you drop us a message over the Facebook or Twitter channels with your mobile number and your Community username, the team would love to help with this. You can find how to contact us here. 

[vodkaphonejill]

I do not wish to deal with an arrears matter via non-ntrusted 3rd party platforms such as Twitter or Facebook.

I have also tried your chat on two browsers on a desktop PC (firefox and Chrome) and on an android device, and it never loads.

[MarkD]

We would recommend that you give us a call up @vodkaphonejill. We know that you've tried this before, however, we would need your account details to take a look a query which we can't take on the Community 🙂

[vodkaphonejill]

It's an ordinary payg SIM with a Big Value Bundle option.  the Big Value Bundle (£10) autorenews each month but it is paid for with the credit on the phone, and we keep that topped with regular manual payments - NOT by Direct Debit, NOT by a contract. Everyone assures me that Big Value Bundle is a PAYG account which it is.

Everyone acknowledges that we do NOT owe money to Vodafone, they've done checks back to 2014, yet the dashboard on My Account clearly states "you are in arrears, make payment now" and when I click through on that button it reveals the amount - of several hundred pounds. It went up by £50 the day I started complaining about it. Vodafone want me to ignore it, but simply cannot explain why a PAYG dashboard, with no access to billing (because PAYG can't run up bills) shows "you are in arrears" to the tune of several hundred quid. Believe me - I've spent HOURS on this with Vodafone, and they haven't got a clue why it's happening and they have run credit checks on previous addresses - we've all only every had PAYG - NEVER contracts not even rolling ones - they keep telling me I don't owe them money - but the website stubbornly insists "you are in arrears" and the amount goes UP. Just spent two hours on the chat, and yet again been promised a call back.  they would like me to just ignore it - but who ignores a website from a utility telling you "you are in arrears" to the tune of several hundred pounds?

[vodkaphonejill]

Sorry -- but I have history with internet privacy campaigning going back years. There is no way you are going to convince me to use either Twitter or Facebook to share this sort of thing in an attributable way. I simply do not trust them and no one should trust them. I've watched Zuckerberg giving evidence to the US congress (and refusing to give evidence to our parliament) - and although I use Twitter, I don't trust them either. Millions do, but that is their decision - they are Twitter and Facebook's product, not their customers.

I finally managed to get the chat to work, and after TWO hours on line with three or was it four? separate people following one another, they finally escalated it to complaints - but I had to be very very stubborn repeatedly refusing their assurances that everything was fine. They are incredibly resistant to escalating issues. I also did some research about their massive Ombudsman fines  back in 2016 - over billing and customer service, and discovered the Resolver complaints traker recommended by moneysupermarket.com - all stored away for future reference. NO company should be this awful at custmer service - I'd estimate I've spent somewhere between 12-24 hours in total usually in two hour stretches, and it still isn't resolved - just escalated. I did mention near the end that their website was making a defamatory statement about my wife, by stating that she was "in arrears" for hundreds of pounds, and it was visible to me as an added user on their account, and that it was actionable in law. Maybe that finally got me escalated? I don't know. Best wishes.

[bubblefish]

Hi

You are not the only one; Tonight my partner checked his payg vfone account and it said he was 60p in arrears?

so i logged on mine and omg it said i was £108.30 in arrears - ive been on live chat - got put thru to someone - she was checking into it with the payg team - I was told that its an error and that it will be removed

I have clearly said i do not wish to see i am in arrears at the top of my payg account as i have never had arrears at all - she assured me this was being worked on by a team and it should vanish shortly

My concern is how many 1000s of folk are seeing that and clicking on pay it now !!! not realising - this isnt good at all - think it needs to be escalated really maybe to martin lewis resolver complaints or trading standards. I will give them a couple of weeks to sort it but after that im afraid im gonna escalate it

[vodkaphonejill]

An update on my original post.

After a lot of hard work (I started on this sev. weeks ago) I forced escalation to Complaints, via Online Chat (telephone cust. services were a total repeated failure). I got personal complaints handler who has just this week got the "you are in arrears" entry from my wife's PAYG a/c, removed.

However, the "you are in arrears" statement is still on MY PAYG dashboard, and she tells me it will escalate to over £200 during September but she is now working on getting it removed from my PAYG a/c too.

She has admitted it is a systemic problem not an "individual a/c" problem but we are nowhere nearer an explanation.

The way I have left it is that unless they can provide an explanation and a timescale for fixing the systemic problem, then I will request a deadlock letter.

One thing to note is that AFAICS it isn't actually possible to "pay" these arrears, when you click on to the "Make Payment" option, on the new page, which tells you how much you are "in arrears", the payment buttons are greyed out - but I haven't checked all the way through to see that is the case with every payment option (card/credit etc)

I recommend anyone with the energy to raise this with 3rd party consumer bodies - I tried a newspaper consumer column but got no reply. Ofcom won't do anything till you get a deadlock letter. If you have a Twitter a/c you might like to highlight it on social media tagging @VodafoneUK, to alert other customers out there.