New customer, double billed!

[#1]

Of course the other aspect of the problem is that there isn't a 14 day notice before the direct debit overcharge is claimed in the beginning.
Sorting out getting money back to people quickly, when wrongly taken, is very important... but so would be minimising the number of times money is wrongly taken in the first place! That obviously involves fixing the safeguard checks which prevent billing problems occurring in future, which is the most crucial aspect, which the team have been looking at and have made good progress on - so that part is in hand. But even with all the checks in the world and a perfect system at your end, there will still be occasional times when a bill is wrong (because supplier data is up the creek, or someone presses the wrong button etc)... and that is why you also need to lengthen the direct debit notice to allow a good time for the customer to check the bill, report any mistake to you, and get the rectified long before the money even leaves their account.
Then for the very few times something goes unnoticed in the future, and needs a refund issuing, then improving the speed of refund aspects will make a massive difference to the frustration and anger levels of the customers involved.
As I know from PUG, this is being taken seriously by Plusnet, at the highest levels of management. I hope in due course we will have good news on all these fronts, and that you are tackling it in a holistic manner. I think it is only when this has been tackled on all those fronts will the issue have finally been put to bed.
Glad to hear you are proactively hunting out over-charged customers to issue them refunds even if they haven't noticed this themselves.
Mike

[#2]

I want to be really clear that when we have made a mistake it is no way the customers fault, and I agree we are taking too long to process requests for refunds.  Having reviewed this today with the team we do have an internal lag which means it can take upto 76 hours before the request is submitted to the bank for processing.  I'm going to look at how we can change this quickly and ensure that we process refunds quickly and provide confidence to our customers.  I'll also look at whether we can issue a refund before the DD has been collected as I see the point your making here Jelv.  I'll provide an update on this by the middle of next week.
@shutter To be clear we have been aware of the billing issues since late December following the change in November which caused and increase in the number of complaints.  We kicked off a review following the VAT change which we completed in January to understand the issues, and we have been actively refunding customers in February and March who we know who have been effected.
I'm absolutely committed to resolving the issues and improving the perceptions of our billing processes. 
Thanks,
F

[#3]

Quote from: xpcomputers

you also need to lengthen the direct debit notice to allow a good time for the customer to check the bill, report any mistake to you, and get the rectified long before the money even leaves their account.

Bingo. If Plusnet actually had a reasonable period before they started taking a DD payment then I know that my level of frustration over the various refunds I've had to claim would have been reduced. I'm 99% certain I've said this before, but I'll say it again: giving the customer no notice period whatsoever, in my opinion, smacks of Plusnet putting their bank account first and the customer second – and considering the prevalence of billing issues over the last year or two, it's frankly quite rude.
So yes, I think amending the notice period is something that needs to be considered with the utmost priority.

[#4]

@ Fletch....
Thank you for your response.... I am glad that you are aware of problems, and doing something about it..... however two quotes seem to dispel this ...

Quote

We have incorrectly billed a number of customers which has been caused by a series of implementation mistakes which goes back to February 2009

In a previous post, I asked the question "why" ..... but somehow that got ignored.....

Quote

@shutter To be clear we have been aware of the billing issues since late December following the change in November which caused and increase in the number of complaints.

SO .... although you are now claiming to be doing something..... it seems from the above quotes that you have been aware of mistakes as far back as  Feb 2009, yet you have only been aware of the billing issuese since late December.......... and are just getting around to fixing them..... 
As Be3g says

Quote

giving the customer no notice period whatsoever, in my opinion, smacks of Plusnet putting their bank account first and the customer second – and considering the prevalence of billing issues over the last year or two, it's frankly quite rude.

the point about PlusNet putting "their" bank account first seems to directly affect the customer, much more than it would PlusNet.....
is the quantity of "incorrect billing" mistakes, so huge, that it would not be feasible for a suitably qualified, senior staff member, to sit at a keyboard, for a couple of days, and initiate the refunds by direct input, rather than "let`s sort out the software problems first, and the refunds will eventually be disbursed".....  This is money which rightfully belongs in the customer`s account...... not PlusNet`s.... as you have already admitted.....

[#5]

At what point did Fletch say they knew about the problems back in Feb 09?  He said the problems started due to a change in Feb 09, but that doesn't mean they knew about the problems then.
Phil

[#6]

That's how I read it. That Plusnet became aware of specific problems in Dec 2009. I'm guessing until that point, individual errors were corrected as one off problems. It was only in late Dec 2009 that the dots in the picture got joined up and it was appreciated that this was a bigger problem. Those subsequent investigations have then revealed that the problems have actually been in existence since Feb 2009 when they made some needed changes and also introduced at the same time a few  (ahem)  "unplanned features"    to the billing platform in the changes back then and again in Nov 2009.
Presumably that is why they have had a team since Jan fixing everything up, to isolate all the occasions where a particular action causes a particular fault, and fix the logic that allows it. When you have hundreds of thousands of customers, you can't have someone who checks every bill by hand... you have to depend on logic rules to handle it for you. When it works well, it is amazing.... and if something goes wrong, you get this!
The proactive alerting of customers will presumably involve creating some rules to check for those fringe cases in the last 13 months, and check all the previous bill again, and make it flag up any accounts that have a billing error that is unresolved.
I might have got the wrong end of the stick though... I have before... and no doubt I will again!
So for me, the issue is how quick this can all be resolved both the proactive refunds & the fixes to the platform (which seem to be in hand)..... but also for Plusnet to make the process changes required to speed up the refunds time and give a much longer notice period. Only then will the platform have the stability it needs.
Mike

[#7]

Quote from: xpcomputers

I might have got the wrong end of the stick though... I have before... and no doubt I will again!

Bingo!  That's pretty much it exactly.

[#8]

My email today to NoNet, sorry PlusnetWhy has the £45.48 Plusnet stole from me on 10-03-10 only reached my bank account today despite a credit note having been raised on 19-03-10.
Says it all
Don't expect your money back anytime soon........Robbin Bar Stewards

[#9]

dustymil59
Frustrating I know....
The Plusnet Usergroup have been discussing these issues with Plusnet for several months now, and we share your concern about how long refunds have been taking to be issued (amongst the other related problems of DD notice time, and the billing issues themselves). There are positive noises being made by Fletch (see above) which means things might get better in the future but until they get sorted and we see that change happen, it is still hypothetical!
So I'm hopeful the comments people like you are making might help to keep this issue on the radar until the change happens. It isn't much consolation for you waiting so long for yours, but your input might help some poor soul following you to get a better experience.
Mike

[#10]

Hi Mike,
Thanks for you words of encouragement, I think we all owe a debt of gratitude to people like you who take up the cause.
It's not as though I want anything "extra", though PN are extremely quick to offer credits, it's so little it makes no difference. I just want something like the service I pay for, and am happy to pay for.
Keep up the good work.
Dusty

[#11]

Finally received the refund today, 20 days after it left my bank account, 19 days after I reported it.
Not really good enough to take that long to return wrongly taken money.
While I have huge gratitute for the helpfulness of the Plusnet staff, their systems really need to be sorted out to speed up refunds or not overcharge people in the first place.

[#12]

Quote from: Fletch

I'll also look at whether we can issue a refund before the DD has been collected as I see the point your making here Jelv.  I'll provide an update on this by the middle of next week.

As promised an update on progress.  I've reviewed the process and we are taking too long to process refunds.  Currently, we only process the refunds files to our bank on Monday and Thursday, then this is passed for approval if there are any refunds over a specific amount which can add a further delay.  This clearly isn't good enough so this is what we are going to do:
From Tuesday next week we will be processing the refunds daily, and we will split the files into two so that any transactions requiring authorisation will be processed separately to those that can be processed immediately.
We should start to see a turn around time of 3 to 4 working days from next week to process the refund and have it back into your account.
Thanks,
Fletch

[#13]

Thanks Fletch,
That is the sort of news we all want to hear!  Not much consolation for those who've already had to wait, but excellent news for anyone caught with a billing mistake in future (or anyone still awaiting a refund!)
Thanks for listening and pushing for a change. I hope we'll see a similar change in DD notice period in due course too, which should then complete the round up of this current saga from all sides.
e.g.

• Minimise mistakes in first place by fixing billing platform. (in progress)


• Pro-actively find those who've been billed incorrectly and refund them. (in progress)


• Speed up refund process so that refunds are tackled in a timely manner. (in progress)


• Change DD notice period, to allow for mistakes to be rectified before being taken from bank in first place. (this will be the main one left outstanding if the others are all making good progress!).

The other thing to look at are the processes that allowed the billing mistakes to get into the platform too, and to change the processes and checks such that these sorts of problems are caught in future before being inflicted upon customers the next time anything needs changing on the billing platform. I'm assuming this also has been put on the radar to be looked at?
Looking forward to seeing the back of this event, as I'm sure all the staff and customers involved will be too. 
Mike

[#14]

That is very good news Fletch.
One thing you haven't said is whether processing of the refund will still be dependant on confirmation that the DD has been successful or whether this is just a speed up in the process once the confirmation has been received.

[#15]

Good question Jelv.
Hopefully the answer is it is processed immediately....
I can see both sides of this one though, since if the DD doesn't go through, then Plusnet possibly end up out of pocket by the bill amount and the refund amount.
BUT at the end of the day, that is much better than the customer being out of pocket for the bill amount AND the overcharge amount.... it is a shift of risk and in most cases will be fine. If on a rare occasion Plusnet find themselves out of pocket due to a hasty refund, then this is no different than what the customer currently has to endure!!! I think this would be such a fringe scenario (a small percentage of a small percentage of cases), that Plusnet could undertake to refund immediately and take on that risk themselves, rather than making the customer fund the mistake in every case.
Lets put some made up figures on it (these both will hopefully be way to high, but will give the idea using round numbers)...
Picture it being 1% of cases that need a refund. Then 1% of these refund cases (eg 0.01%) had DD not process correctly first so Plusnet might get out of pocket. Is it better for Plusnet to hold all the refunds for extra days (1% of transactions) to cover themselves for the 0.01% of cases where Plusnet might end up out of pocket by processing the refund early. I think it is a fair risk for Plusnet compared with annoying customers with extra delays!....
Especially since that initial 1% should be WAY too high .... even in the current spate of problems it must have been a much smaller percentage than this (hopefully it is much lower even that 0.01% need a refund and 0.00001% might fail DD after a refund). And once the platform is fixed, that percentage will drop even further. Plusnet can always recover the full amount owing as they have done when calls were wrongly billed, so they'd only be out of pocket a short time if anything went wrong. And since the trigger scenario is that Plusnet would have had to mess the billing up in the first place (to necessitate a refund to be issued), it seems only fair that they minimise the refund processing time to shortest possible time (eg not wait for money to arrive in their account), and take on the risk of being temporarily out of pocket to rectify this.
If we look at all the improvements we are talking about, we can see that the platform fixes will reduce the number of billing errors in the first place, Then a change to the DD notice period will hopefully further reduce these fringe cases by allowing billing mistakes to be spotted and rectified before payment is even taken. If you complete all that work, then the fringe risk of offering an immediate refund before DD arrives, should be so minimal a scenario, that the costs of underwriting it for keeping happy customers has got to be worth enduring.
Hopefully this makes sense and the bean counters will agree.
At the end of the day Plusnet have had lots of second place awards for service in the last few years.... and making the top spot is dependant on going the extra mile to please the customers. This recent mess up must have dented that customer satisfaction record, so you'll need to work hard to keep awards rolling in anyway. I still think Plusnet have got it within them to turn this around and make it a success... lets get that trophy cabinet full of first place awards! Put the customer first in the area of refunds.
So over to Fletch. What do you say?
Mike