If anyone remembers my thread on Telefonica about trying to get a phone and internet this is the latest. In brief they came in 2008 and only fitted an internet link via satellite dish stating that they couldn't provide a phone. They placed the dish on my neighbours aerial on top of his terrace, without his permission, and left. It didn't work so I rang them from work the next day and told them to take it away. They came a month later to take it but they also installed a phone via WII FI. Great, but then 2 months later they took €229's from my bank which I cancelled as there was no reason given, and if it was for installing Internet, which I didn't have, then they could go and whistle. Then they started sending me bills every month for internet rental of €45's. Every month I rang them and they said ignore it as "we know you don't have the internet and all your bills are up to date". I told them that someone at Telefonica is sending me these bills so can I speak to them? They insisted that the bills don't exist even though I had them in my hand and that I should ignore them as it must be a mistake. Then I received a threatening letter from bailiffs in Madrid. I rang Telefonica and they said ignore it as it's just a mistake and they must have me mixed up with someone else, as, and I quote, "You don't have the internet". On Monday 24th August I received a letter from a firm of solicitors in Malaga who said I had 7 days to pay or they were taking me to court. I asked my neighbour to help as she speaks Spanish and she spent the whole of Monday on the phone being passed from pillar to post and constantly being told that I didn't have the internet, so ignore it. Apparently, if this was allowed to proceed I would end up being black-listed throughout the whole of Spain and wouldn't be able to buy a packet of sweets on credit EVER! Finally she got through to a woman who said what had happened was that the original internet line that I had been given belonged to a business and I was being billed incorrectly. "No", we said, the bills have my name on them. Then she said that when the new phone was installed the internet line that didn't work was never cancelled. But she said that she couldn't cancel it and that we would have to go to a Telefonica shop to sort it out. Okay then, so where is the nearest shop to Manilva? "Marbella", was the reply ,and we were given the exact address. We rang the shop to find out what time they closed and they said in 20 minutes. So next morning we travelled to Marbella and went to the shop. Once there my friend explained the problem to the manager in Spanish who looked at her as if we were both mad and, with a lot of shrugging of the shoulders, he told us that all Telefonica had these days were shops that sell phones and they couldn't deal with any problems like this ANYWHERE in Spain as it all had to be dealt with over the phone. Fuming we drove back to Manilva and then down the hill to Sabinillas to got to the Consumer Protection Office. We parked up and guess what we parked infront of? Yes, it was a Telefonica shop that sold phones, so, in fact the nearest Telefonica shop was about 1/2 mile away and not MARBELLA!. The Consumer Protection Office were very helpful and they took down the whole story and looked at the documentary evidence. They sent an official government document to Telefonica nd their solicitors telling them that they have a month to either drop their claim or sort it out. They also told me not to pay any money to these solicitors as it would take years to get the money back, but if I had anymore correspondence from them I was to take it straight to them for them to deal with. Relieved we went home but my neighbour said she was going to ring Telefonica again to see if she could get anywhere and to tell them what we had done. After about an hour on the phone she finally got through to a department head who seemed to understand what had happened and he said he would investigate it and tell the solicitors to back off and that he would ring us either Tuesday afternoon, or Wednesday to inform us about his progress. Guess what? Up to now there has been no phonecall.
It defies logic that any company could be so massively incompetent. How do they even exist? It's incredible! All I wanted was a phone, it's not rocket science!
This message was last edited by orda on 26/08/2009.