Unlimited Web Use and other lies by Vodafone and Mobile Phones Direct

Having been lied to by Orange, regarding the removal of a cap on my broadband connection if I took out a mobile phone contract (see: The future is Orange - unfortunately), I managed to get the contract annulled by contacting OfCom and CISAS.

I then found a contract with Vodafone via a company called Mobile Phones Direct. The contract was £34.25 per month for 24 months with a Nokia N97 and included 700 cross network minutes, 250 text messages and unlimited web use - I asked both Mobile Phones Direct for a copy of the contract in writing to verify the plan but neither company provided anything.

When the phone arrived it was in a sealed box which stated that it could only be returned within seven days if the seal on the box was not broken. I actually pondered for a while before I eventually did so.

From the moment I started to try to use the phone there were problems. There was rarely a good signal, incoming calls would disconnect as soon as I tried to answer them and the phone would not start up. There was actually a vast catalogue of problems which I (and many other people) posted on the Vodafone and Nokia website forums including there being no means of getting Music onto the phone from a Mac (the Nokia Multimedia Transfer application for Mac was not compatible with Nokia's flagship phone!).

Within the first couple of days I had a courtesy call from Vodafone (which was barely audible due to a whistling sound) during which I said I was having a lot of problems with the phone. I understood from the Vodaphone representative that I had a week to return the phone - but having read that firmware updates cured most (if not all) of the issues I was facing, I decided to wait until new firmware was issued for the product code of my N97.

I also discovered that 'unlimited web use' was subject to a 'fair use' policy which actually meant that it was limited to 500Mb per month. Given that the phone is touted as being a multimedia platform with built in YouTube application, 500Mb would be extremely limited!

The next couple of weeks was a procession of problems during which time I contacted both Mobile Phones Direct and Vodafone - each referring me back to the other and both telling me that I could no longer return the phone as it was no longer within seven days of its receipt.

The phone had to be returned to factory settings (a complete reset) on three occasions - losing all data (phone numbers, photos etc.) and I was becoming extremely concerned that I neither company would offer me support for a phone which worked less than half of the time it was switched on.

At one point, I had a call from Vodafone but it was only for a customer survey. I was brutally honest. A few days later, I had a call from a customer services at Vodafone asking why I was so unhappy. I explained all but was offered no solution. I said I just wanted to return the phone but was told that that was not possible after seven days.

Eventually, Mobile Phones Direct offered to replace the phone but by this time I was sick to death of the phone, the contract, Mobile Phones Direct and Vodafone. I said I wanted to return the phone and end the contract as I did not feel that either company had been honest with me or offered me anything approaching a reasonable level of support. I was told that that was not possible as I had now gone beyond the 28 days during which the phone could have been returned. This enraged me because I had already been told that:

a) The phone could not be returned if the seal on the box was broken
b) The phone could only be returned within seven days (by both Vodafone and Mobile Phones Direct)
c) That the phone could only be returned within 14 days (by Vodafone)
I decided that the only thing to do was return the phone to Mobile Phones Direct, cancel my direct debit and pursue the battle from the other side of the line if either company wanted to take issue with me.

Mobile Phones Direct then returned the phone but I refused to accept it. It bounced its way back and forth from them to me until it finally rested at their premises in Southampton.

I then received a bill from Vodafone stating that they had charged me £704.37 for cancelling the contract early:

I went away for a couple of weeks and came back to another bill. This time for £1,410.24:

I phoned Vodafone to discuss this and they admitted that they had charged me twice for the alleged 'early cancellation of the contract' - although, in reality, the contract was not honoured or even valid if the terms were ambiguous.

I stated quite adamantly that I believed that Vodafone and Mobile Phones Direct had been less than honest in their promotion of the contract and had been totalally dishonest regarding the terms and conditions insofar as the period during which the phone could be returned. I stated that during the month I had been in possession of the phone I had been able to use the phone in its most fundamental capacity (i.e. merely to make phone calls and send text messages) about half of the time and I was only prepared to pay half a month's line rental.

Since then, Vodafone have set the dogs on me. I have been hounded by phone calls from a debt collection agency called capQuest who now seek to recover a total of £1,510.24:

I had, perhaps naively, believed that Vodafone and/or Mobile Phones Direct would accept that they had acted less than honestly and fell woefully short in their customer support and would write this off as a lesson in how not to try to deceive customers and how not to neglect to provide an adequate level of support.

The next step will be to contact OfCom and CISAS once more. Dealing with any company who make offers they cannot or will not honour is an increasingly hazardous pursuit - but Vodafone and Mobile Phones Direct have proven themselves to be exemplars of mendacity!

Blackpool Illuminations - The Green Light Green Wash

Anybody visiting Blackpool would struggle to recognise anything of any environmental value but it isn't through lack of effort by their public relations department. You'd think you were entering a satellite of the Machynlleth Centre for Alternative Technology .

Take Blackpool's Illuminations, its biggest tourist attraction the switching on of which the Blackpool Gazette claims 100,000 people attended. One of the first tableaux the visitor to the 'lights' will see is The Green Machine.

This, by its own definition, is a 34m tableau entirely lit by 24v LED lamps which reduces power consumption by 82%.

Five photo voltaic solar panels charge five sets of batteries during the day to power the tableau at night.

Very commendable!

But at 34m (112ft) The Green Machine is just a tiny part of the five miles of light pollution produced in the name of tourism every year. It was first launched in 2006, three years ago, during which time there has been no visible progress in rolling out the sustainable technology it boasts to the rest of the spectacle. It could be asserted that it is positioned at the start of a north/south journey through the lights in order to exaggerate the environmental credentials.

But as can be seen from the images below, there is more than just the environmental boasts of the technology worthy of scrutiny. What exactly is this Green Machine trying to say? The message is totally incoherent - it's as if a focus group comprising of kindergarten kids was asked what they thought of when they heard the words 'environmental bullshit'.

What on earth have vitamins A, B, C, D and E (extinghuished) got to do with the environment? Fruit and Veg, Carbohydrates? Dairy? Fish? All cobbled together with pointless buzz words like Hazardous Waste and 100% Recyclable.

The total result is a dazzling fountain of hogwash.


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How to lose friends without really trying - Part One: Alcohol

If a drunk driver kills a child who runs out between two parked cars, nobody would question their guilt. Their drunkenness at the wheel would be a crime in itself. Their reactions would be impaired by their intoxication.

Somebody who thinks that it is a good idea to have a swim in the sea when they have had a few too many is not likely to have much sympathy from the lifeboat men who risk their lives to save them. If they drown, it may sound callous, but they will have been a victim of their own stupidity. As the late, great Bill Hicks said of the apocryphal person who, having taken LSD, jumped from the roof of a building thinking they could fly, what a dick! If they thought they could fly, why not take off from the ground.

Now, without wanting want to make this personal, if somebody's reasoning is affected because they have debilitated themselves with alcohol (or any other substance) and mishear what somebody says, then completely fly off the handle and launch into a personal attack, it would seem unreasonable to most level-headed people that the person who misheard might expect an apology from the speaker for saying something completely innocent.

If you looked a bit like somebody who had stolen my car and then I see you when I am drunk and beat you up, should you apologise to me for having some resemblance to the thief?

This is why I stopped drinking and avoid being around people who are drunk. Unfortunately, it isn't always possible to avoid situations where people are drinking beyond their capacity - some people cannot enjoy themselves without exceeding their limits. As a result, I am faced with the probability of losing a friend because another person expects me to apologise for saying something which they thought they heard. To atone would not only be dishonest but it would acquiesce to their drunken irrationality. Is it better to go to prison for something you haven't done or plead guilty to avoid a custodial sentence?

Pensioners pay for digital revolution

The UK Culture secretary has just announced that the expansion of the country's broadband service will be paid for with a 50p per month levy on home phone lines.

Whilst that may seem like small potatoes to a household with a digital home hub but pensioners who are least likely to make heavy bandwidth demands - if they have internet access at all (I can think of plenty that I know personally) are proportionally going to have to contribute more than anybody.

This looks like just another skimming poll tax, albeit small. If the government really believes in a market economy (as their neo-Thatcherite leadership have continued to ram down our throats on the Iron Lady's behalf) then the finance for this infrastructure development should come from the companies who have been profiting from the frequently abysmal service they have been providing.

The hidden cost of ID cards - and driving licenses

It was a bit late in life that I eventually passed my driving test. The reasons were complicated. A bit of renegade environmentalism, a bit of personal economics and a bit of fear. By the time I passed the photo license had been introduced and as much as I may have objected to having one there was no visible national resistance - as there is against ID cards now.

Ten years down the line and I have just received a license renewal form. I have to provide a new photo - even though the photo on the license is so small (22mm x 17mm) and foggy (it looks like it was printed on a first generation inkjet printer) and that I any wrinkles I may have accumulated are clearly invisible. I had no hair then and I have not been using any hair restorer nor have I resorted to follicle implants.

I don't remember being told (when I wasn't given the choice about having a photo license) that it was going to have to be renewed every ten years - nor, more significantly, that it was going to cost £20 every time.

I've long cautioned about objecting to the introduction of ID cards on the grounds of cost - it would be so simple to placate such objections by simply saying that instead of charging £100 they can be had for £25. Many objectors would then say, 'actually, that sounds quite reasonable' and roll over to be shafted by the tool of the police state under the impression that they were getting a bargain.

But it should be noted by those who may not object to an affordable tyranny that it may well be unknowingly sold to them on the never-never.

The future is Orange - unfortunately

I've had a mobile phone with Orange one way or another since about 1997 and I was one of Freeserve's original customers back in 1998 - Freeserve being taken over by Wanadoo in 2000 which was then acquired by Orange in 2006.

In recent years, as an Orange mobile customer, I was entitled to a free broadband service. Due to my heavy internet use, in 2008 my broadband connection was capped between 6.00pm and midnight to 50k/s - there later transpired some confusion with conflicting letters saying that the cap had been lifted and that it had not. Regardless, the cap remained.

When my mobile contract expired and having had some problems with a broken phone which neither Orange, Nokia or Phones4U were prepared to address, I decided to move my mobile phone and broadband to O2 and phoned Orange to inform them of my intention to leave.

Their loyalty department offered me a competitive mobile phone deal which entitled me to a discounted unlimited broadband service. I pointed out that I was being capped on my free broadband connection and said that I would accept the deal so long as the cap was lifted - I accepted that my free broadband connection had been capped but I wasn't prepared to pay for a capped service. The Orange representative assured me that the cap would be lifted within 7 to 10 days.

A month later, the cap was still evident. I phoned Orange to complain. On my first attempt I found myself talking to somebody in a call centre in Asia who didn't understand my situation at all and first of all said that my connection was slow because it is busier at those times and then told me that the cap was there for legal reasons. I gave up and tried again, managing to speak to somebody who assured me that the cap would be lifted very soon and that I should contact them when it was lifted to receive a refund for the period when it was in place.

Three months into my contract the cap remained. I tried again to speak to somebody at Orange and eventually spoke to somebody else who repeated the promise that the cap would eventually be lifted but having reached a point of exasperation I used the Orange website contact form to inform them that unless the situation was dealt with within a week I would take the issue to OfCom. Having heard nothing for a week, that is what I did.

OfCom informed me that as the terms agreed on the phone had not been met, I would be entitled to terminate my contract. They gave me a reference number and a high level support phone number at Orange. When I then phoned Orange with this information, they assured me that it would be addressed immediately and that somebody would reply within 24 hours.

Needless to say, nobody at Orange did contact me within 24 hours so five days later I phoned them again. They said that somebody would phone me back within a few hours and this time they did. They informed me that there was no way that under any circumstances the cap could be lifted. They agreed to refund me for the 3 months plus which I had paid for the capped broadband service. When I challenged them that my mobile phone contract was taken out on the strength of their promise I was passed on to their mobile phone division who basically stated that the two departments were unconnected and that if I attempted to terminate my contract, I would be charged for the 14 months plus which remained or I would have to pay the full retail price of the handset - a Nokia 5800 (another story entirely).

So, in a nutshell, Orange retained me as a mobile phone customer by promising me that a limitation on my broadband service (then free ) would be removed if I also signed up for a home broadband package - when in fact they were not going to do so.

No firmware updates for the Nokia 5800 on Orange

Orange customers with a Nokia 5800, product code 0576921 can expect a very long wait before Orange decide to release the latest firmware.

Nokia 5800 owners on other carriers have had access to version 21 of the phone's firmware as have some Orange customers but those with this product code seem to be told to go and whistle by Orange as they seem to be stuck with version 11. As people with version 11 firmware are discovering, some new software and new versions of software do not work on older versions of firmware.

The latest firmware (or software, as Nokia calls it on its site) can be checked by going to this page:

europe.nokia.com/A4577224

When contacted, Orange have variously said that it is Nokia's responsibility, that the phone is not compatible with the later versions of the firmware or that they don't know anything about it.

Nokia are quite unequivocal about it. In an e-mail reply to my enquiry, they state:

'With regard to your email, kindly note that software update availability is based on many things, including existing Nokia device firmware version, country, and operator. It may be due to one of these variables that your Nokia device isn't eligible for updates.

Please note that your mobile service provider, operator, or carrier may not have approved the latest Nokia device firmware available. Nokia produces many different variants of each product (for different countries and languages) and not all variants have the latest Nokia device firmware.'

Given that version 21 of the Nokia 5800 firmware is available for most other 5800 users and that it has been shown by some users with Nokia 5800s with the product code 0576921 who have changed the product code, and successfully installed and run the version 21 firmware, this is an issue entirely of Orange's making.