Bonus when changing Orange ADSL formula

[tj]

I read some of the tarif guide, it would appear there are charges for initial connection / installation, and if you want to pay online( dont allow any direct debits ) its another 4 euros surcharge !

Orange are 34.90 month internet, tv , telephone unlimited, 1 hour to mobiles, dont see any competition to them, given they are the largest provider and the lines belong to them, so no probs if you have a line problem rather than internet connection problem.

[tj]

oh I forgot, also a 400 euro deposit if you will not pay by direct debit

[mint]

I fear, tj, that FT and DD are a no, no for me [+o(]

I've repeated this story so many times that I hesitate to bore people with another recital.  But, just for the records, FT took money via direct debits from us for a whole 5 months for internet services BEFORE they could supply us with a line.  Then, of course, they ignored all letters, phone calls, etc. asking for a refund of that money.

In the end, I just thought my time was too valuable to get all cross and annoyed and I just cancelled my contract as soon as the year was up.  I have sworn NEVER AGAIN.

[tj]

dont quite understand your point ? thats why I pay orange / FT online by CB

[mint]

Sorry, if I have misunderstood, tj.  From your post, I read that it was 400 euros deposit unless you pay by DD.  I realise now you weren't talking about FT but Free.

 

[Chancer]

TJ You must have got confused somewhere with the Free terms and conditions.

There are no initial connection charges, you say that they dont allow any direct debits but in the next posting say it costs €400 if you dont pay by direct debit [:-))]

Free want you to pay by direct debit to reduce admin costs and so that any chargeable calls say to UK mobiles can be paid for, they had some consumer association litigation against them citing that they didnt send out factures every month as required by French law and that people could not pay by cheque,so now you can have a paper facture if you want but you have to pay extra for it, if you want to pay by cheque you can but they require a €400 caution.

[tj]

I said I dont allow DD's from my account,,,,,,,and the 400 euros is is you refuse to pay by DD.

and as you will see below, you choose, activation 96 euros or on deactivation less 1.50 euros per month for each month you pay, basically a five year contract.

extract of tarif

Option accès TV 185 chaînes TV - 1,99€/mois

Option Multi TV à partir de 4,99€/mois

Engagement de durée Abonnement mensuel tacitement renouvelable par période d’un mois

Mise à disposition de l’Elément de

Réseau initial

Inclus (Freebox Server, Freebox Player et FreePlugs)

Frais de Mise en Service 96€,

facturation au choix de l'Abonné : dès l'activation, ou en fin de contrat avec avantage fidélité à raison de -1,5€/moisd’abonnement

Frais d'établissement d'accès (locaux

ne disposant pas d'un accès actif à la

boucle locale)

39,99€

Frais de réactivation d'un accès ayant

supporté un service Freebox ou

Alicebox dans le même local au même

100€

Indemnité forfaitaire en cas de nonrestitution

ou dégradation d'éléments

Freebox Server 200€, Freebox Player 200€, Lecteur CD/DVD/BR défectueux 50€, défaut d'aspect 20€

Freebox V5 ou O 150€, Freebox HD 290€, boîtier TV Light 210€

Freebox v4 190€, Freeplug 50€ l’unité, télécommande 20€, Manette Jeux 20€

Prestation d’assistance téléphonique

(32 44)

Inclus dans le forfait si appel depuis une Freebox, depuis un autre opérateur se référer à sa grille tarifaire

Assistance en ligne Inclus 5

Assistance par télécopie 1,35€ par appel + 0,34€/mn

[Chancer]

[quote user="tj"]I said I dont allow DD's from my account,,,,,,,

Close! - you wrote "( dont allow any direct debits )"

[/quote]

I think the frais d'intervention is if you want  someone to come and set it up for you, they will do this for free in certain areas, I didnt pay anything, just the €29.99 per month and one can cancel at any time one months notice.

You could however come unstuck if you lose or damage the Freebox as they want quite a lot of money to replace it even if you are cancelling the contract, they do however make an allowance towards it of €30 per month that you have been a customer which aside from the inflated price is pretty generous as effectively you will have had the service for nothing.

I dont know what other operators do regarding broken/broken down equipment but I have read some horror stories where I believe it was Orange denied having recieved back the livebox or whatever and take the money from the ex customers acount.

[Quillan]

If it's Orange and you take it back to a shop they will give you a receipt. If you send it back then you obviously send it Colissimo and signed for. I heard the same sort of stories about cancelling with TeleConnect so I sent a letter cancelling my contract via 'registered' post and the kit back via Colissimo. I took the proof of posting round to my bank (Bank Populaire) and paid 16 Euros to have the DD stopped which having seen the postage receipts they were more than happy to do. I would assume (yes I know it's dangerous to assume) that you could do the same with Orange, SFR or even Free. In my case they didn't try to take any further money so I lost 16 Euros but if what others have said is true I could have lost a lot more.

If your kit is broken then simply get a returns number from Orange and take it to a Orange shop and if necessary get a replacement then cancel your contract a couple of weeks latter. If it's physically damaged like smashed up then I would have thought that if you have accidental damage on your insurance they will pay for a replacement. We have had a few things replaced this way over the years in France and it does not appear to have effected our insurance re premiums charged etc. The thing I have learnt from my French friends is you really need to know how to 'play the system' here.

I was wondering why TJ does not pay by direct debit, is there a reason?

[Chancer]

Well the horor stories we often read on forums have made me totally paranoid about French banking and direct debits, the only one I have is for Free, I would not have that if there were another way but realistically I am no ven organised enough to pay a credit card bill once a month to avoid interest charges.

All my other bills I pay cash at La Poste or the tresorie publique, my electric bills when I get them now always seem high as they have the previous unpaid bill on them, they dont seem to chase them up very much, I am going to continue stretching it out to see if I can get away with paying quarterly.

[tj]

[quote user="Quillan"]

I was wondering why TJ does not pay by direct debit, is there a reason?

[/quote] Nothing sinister I'm afraid :) Simply, DD's put merchants incharge of your money, they can basically take what they want, when they want ! And they do make mistakes, infact earlier this year I was hit with a rather large bill, which was infact an error, had they had DD facility then the money would have gone from my account, and then I would have had to spend probably more time trying to get it back. As it was, I called them, explained the situation took the name of the employee and left it at that. The next day I had an email confirming the conversation and a credit to cancel the invoice. Probably a more useful reason for not having DD's is it allows you to manage your budget to the best advantage for you, if you have some unexpected expense you may want to delay a payment a few days a week or two even, DD;s dont give you that option. I just like to be the only one to have unlimited access to my bank account, and all the usual bills are easily paid online with a carte bancaire.

[mint]

tj, you might have been speaking on my account!

Since the incident with FT, I now don't do DDs either.  I didn't mind so much in the UK because the banking code relating to DDs did mean that, in the event of dispute, the money is replaced and is only then taken away again if the subsequent investigation finds in the retailer's favour.

Not so, in France and, not only that, you read from one of the earlier posts that the poster had to pay 16 euros to CANCEL a DD!  What a swindle..............

[pachapapa]

[quote user="Chancer"]

TJ You must have got confused somewhere with the Free terms and conditions.

There are no initial connection charges, you say that they dont allow any direct debits but in the next posting say it costs €400 if you dont pay by direct debit [:-))]

Free want you to pay by direct debit to reduce admin costs and so that any chargeable calls say to UK mobiles can be paid for, they had some consumer association litigation against them citing that they didnt send out factures every month as required by French law and that people could not pay by cheque,so now you can have a paper facture if you want but you have to pay extra for it, if you want to pay by cheque you can but they require a €400 caution.

[/quote]

The € 400 covers the router modem, CPL plugs, bits & pieces, etc; an amount similar to value of kit in case the client does a moonlight flit. I wouldn't touch FT with a barge pole so no DD problem to date with Séolis. I now avoid setting up a DD with CA due to the charges now made for setting up and closure. When changing between FAIs/ISPs it is easiest to let the new one close the previous contract. The potential time overlap between service provision is fraught with opportunities for misinterpretation and is likely to incur significant costs with both FAIs service line at Premium rates.

[pachapapa]

SW that lad from Amiens has been dazzling everyone in la france profonde with his Free degrouped bells & whistles wonder box. In mitigation SFR will be introducing a new TV service by satellite in the month of February next, that is why SFR have not jumped on the lets screw the plastic garden gnome out of TVA band-waggon together with the maverick PDG of Free.

[Quillan]

[quote user="sweet 17"]

tj, you might have been speaking on my account!

Since the incident with FT, I now don't do DDs either.  I didn't mind so much in the UK because the banking code relating to DDs did mean that, in the event of dispute, the money is replaced and is only then taken away again if the subsequent investigation finds in the retailer's favour.

Not so, in France and, not only that, you read from one of the earlier posts that the poster had to pay 16 euros to CANCEL a DD!  What a swindle..............

[/quote]

It was me that paid 16 Euros. Once you understand French banking and believe me it's not easy and make a general comparison between the UK and France there really is not much of a difference. It's a bit like, as somebody said to me, you get interest on your bank account in the UK but you don't in France. The problem is you have to read what you need to do in the UK to actually get interest these days on an ordinary account. Interest rates have been lower in the UK than France but then you pay to have a card in France so the difference in interest rates just about balances out the cost of a French card. Likewise you can get DD money put back by the bank in France if it's their fault but you need to know the system and how it works.

As an example, when I sold my old yacht and bought a new one Bank Populaire lost a lot of my money (nearly 200k) and whilst my local bank agreed it was their error they wouldn't put the money in to my account until they found the lost money. I sent an email, in English (because I couldn't find the French expletives to explain my displeasure with the bank), to the Director at Montpelier (our regional HQ) and had the money was in my account within 2 hours. Did they find it in those two hours, I do not know, neither do I care, I just wanted the my money. Loosing that amount of money is not good for the old ticker especially, if like me, you already have a dodgy one. It's not the first time that the local BP has lost peoples money, a person I know of had the same problem except they didn't get in contact with HQ and waited several weeks to get it back. Perhaps if they had done what I was told to do they might have had their money back in a couple of hours, who knows. I also doubt if BP are the only bank where this happens. I have been told by a couple of French people that it pays to move your accounts from bank to bank every six or seven years, keeps them on their toes apparently but then when I asked for a bankers cheque as I was closing my account just after getting my money back they didn't bat an eyelid but I am told UK banks are much the same these days.

My paying the 16 Euros and attempt to get further money out of my account by DD would be stopped and if any got through I would get the money back from the BP irregardless of if they could get it back from TeleConnect or not. I think you will find that in the UK they put the money back straight away from their 'float' but in the long term if they can't get the money back they will take it from your account. This happened to me at Nat West and Abbey Nat and to Mrs 'Q' at Lloyd's over the years.

In short neither banking system is perfect, they differ in some ways but balance out at the end of the day.

Sorry for changing the subject a bit.

[Chancer]

Pachapa, who is the lad from Amiens?

If you meant me although I am not far from Amiens I only have the old Freebox, my friend is waiting delivery of his new one and is trying his best to explain the advantages, my French is up to it but the techy stuff goes over my head, it does sound very clever though, something about high speed data transfer and copying Hd movies to his computer via cat 6 cabling.

Or do you mean the mummys boy with the beard on the Free adverts? Now he definitely could come from around here but not Amiens, they are nowhere near retarded enough [:D]

Actually to say that I come from Amiens is probably the biggest compliment that anyone could pay me and certain to result in me being sent to Coventry for life by the locals, if they hadnt already done so that is!

TJ. I agree wholeheartedly with what you wrote: I just like to be the only one to have unlimited access to my bank account.

Being used to the UK it didnt seem to be much to ask but judging by the reaction of my "personal *anker" when I wanted them to repay monies that they had taken from my account it is like asking to walk on water.

[pachapapa]

The DD called in france an "autorisation de prélèvement" is a useful instrument to effect regular payments to an institution or commercial operation. Whilst with CA there is a cost to set up a prélèvement of € 9 , this charge is not as universally applied as many expat Brits think; there is no set-up charge for prélèvements in favour of the Trésor Public, social organisations and other institutional organisations ( water and electricité for example). One can also effect "opposition" to a prélèvement at ZERO cost as indeed a Credit Card; whereas a cheque or chequier is a significant cost.

The non use of prélèvement for water, electricity, TdH,sewage,TF,etc seems to me as a bit of a no-brainer and frankly I would include the monthly payment of a fixed forfait to an FAI in that category.

[tj]

[quote user="pachapapa"]

The DD called in france an "autorisation de prélèvement" is a useful instrument to effect regular payments to an institution or commercial operation.

[/quote]

I think your missing the point!

Nobody denies prelevements maybe are useful to some people, and especially the organisation,the point is, I for one, and plenty of others prefer to be in control of their accounts.

And as to resolution of errors made by merchants or government bodies come to that,

no prelevements, no errors, no worries !!

[Chancer]

When I am better off I will definitely pay all my bills by direct debit as it is a right pain the way I do it at the moment, especially the electric bill that comes every 2 months, the water bill now being 4 factures a year as opposed to 2 beforehand, nothing changed, just a way of wasting paper and postage, send seperate bills for water and sewage on the same day!

I live on very little money at the moment and really cannot bouclé the fin de mois without having to juggle payments, an unauthorised debit and the time to fight to get the money back would be catastrophic, regarding the taxes foncieres and habitation I would still have to pay the current bills by arrears by the required date and then straight away start paying the next years ones in advance (I realise that is a moot point) my current budget just cannot not cope with that.

I pay €20 per month to a friend who lives some distance from me to store a classic car, I try to pay in advance at the beginning of the year, its only €240 to find but each year it takes longer and longer before I can spare the money, he hastn been paid at all yet for this year, most months started looking like I would be able to but always ended in the same way.

[pachapapa]

[quote user="tj"][quote user="pachapapa"]

The DD called in france an "autorisation de prélèvement" is a useful instrument to effect regular payments to an institution or commercial operation.

[/quote] I think your missing the point! Nobody denies prelevements maybe are useful to some people, and especially the organisation,the point is, I for one, and plenty of others prefer to be in control of their accounts. And as to resolution of errors made by merchants or government bodies come to that, no prelevements, no errors, no worries !![/quote]

I can frankly see no difference from receiving a bill for € x for payment by cheque or credit card at the local office.

OR receiving a detailed bill containing the notification that on a given date some 3/4 weeks in the future a prélèvement will be made of € x.

If I believe that the sum € x is incorrect then I will take immediate steps to rectify the perceived error regardless of the manner of notification.

The last time I had a query recently was when I noticed that my bank statement did not include the expected rubbish collection fee. A quick call to the local Trésor Public established that the cheque had presented 3 days after the period covered by the statement of account.

I find your arguments about as convincing as Grecian Anarchist.[:)]

[tj]

[quote user="pachapapa"]

I can frankly see no difference from receiving a bill for € x for payment by cheque or credit card at the local office.

OR receiving a detailed bill containing the notification that on a given date some 3/4 weeks in the future a prélèvement will be made of € x.

[/quote]

I agree with you, its quite obvious you cannot, so further discussion is quite pointless!

[pachapapa]

[quote user="tj"][quote user="pachapapa"]

I can frankly see no difference from receiving a bill for € x for payment by cheque or credit card at the local office.

OR receiving a detailed bill containing the notification that on a given date some 3/4 weeks in the future a prélèvement will be made of € x.

[/quote] I agree with you, its quite obvious you cannot, so further discussion is quite pointless![/quote]

I win![6] Dont take it so serious...Best wishes for a prosperous new year.

[mint]

Excuse me harking back to this thread but I did promise/threaten to let you know about my SFR experience.

Pacha, I went to the shop in Angouleme (la Couronne) and found them not much interested as they were there to sell mobile phones and not help people with changing their address.

But, at my insistence, they did call for me and then handed the phone for me to talk!  Alas, my telephone French wasn't really up to what was required so they said they'd get an English speaker to call me back.

No sooner had I got home than SFR was on the line.  Lovely person, said she'd change my service to my new address on 18 Feb.  All well and good.  Came back to Chateau 17 today, found 2 emails, one to confirm I'd asked for the service to be provided at my new address and one to say the service would be available from 2 February!

Sounds good?  But, wait for it, the phone in the new place has been suspended but all services as normal here in the old house.  Now I don't know whom to contact.  SFR or PhoneExpat with whom I still have a contract for the new house till end of February.  Wish I'd never agreed to take over the contract from the people we bought the house from but I was up to my eyes in "details" at the time and it was as much to get everyone off my back as anything else.

Still, as long as I am back on phone and internet in Chateau 24, I shall have no complaints.

Any further advice, anyone?

[pachapapa]

A bit complicated this thread§ Got a migraine sorting the wheat from the chaff. The problem is almost certainly with the contract with Phonexpat due only to terminate at the end of February. Phonexpat as agents for the previous subscribers will have had an arrangement with France Telecom for some sort of exclusive service provision to the house telephone number; this arrangement would terminate at the end February when the line would have reverted to the exclusive control of France Telecom. I would presume that the physical line would be a disconnected line with no French Telecom number assigned to it. BUT it may be that the telephone number when the service was provided by PE was the FT number and if this is the case the reversion of the line to FT might result in a disconnected physical FT line BUT with a FT number.

Does this paragraph make any sense?  Does the number at C24 start with 05 or maybe a 08 or maybe a 09 or is it something else peculiar to Phonexpat?  Just the first two numbers..dont broadcast the complete number.

[WJT]

Does anyone know if the TV packages offered with broadband work with a Sky satellite dish? We aren't eligible for a fibre optic line.

It is very coincidental because I just asked the question on another forum. I am in the process now of trying to decide which provider to go with, after reading this thread I am even more confused. One worry I have is if not with Orange/France Telecom, is it more problematic if something goes wrong with the actual line?

It looks like it would be between Orange, SFR and Free, but I am not sure what the differences are. [8-)]