Cristiano on Tech/Life

I’m currently without my MacBook so I have to rely on others’ photos for now. This photo was shot by our good friend Carlo Nicora, who was looking for someone to take some photographs of for his portfolio. We were looking for some new photos of us, so we came together on a Sunday afternoon in Regent Park to be photographed.

Photo by Carlo Nicora

I must admit, I am a horrible person to take photos of. As a photographer I am way to aware of when someone is making a photo, leading to less than spontaneous results. Carlo (and Fabiana) made some very nice photos though, and I will slowly pick them and upload them here in time.

Thank you Carlo and Fab, you are great photograhers!

So we’re without broadband. Why? Because British companies are unable to do something as simple as banking. You would expect that in a time like this banking should be something that would be as simple as buying bread. But NO, apparently banking in the UK is something difficult.

So what happened? It started off with me not having enough funding in my bank account for two successive months to pay my Orange bill. Now don’t worry, I’m not in any financial trouble. The thing is, I only use my NatWest account (until recently) for paying my BT and Orange bill. And as the current Euro-to-GBP exchange rate is getting more favorite every day, I leave as much money in my Dutch bank account as I can and only transfer a fixed amount to my NatWest account every month.

So after the second month I got a nice email from Orange explaining to me that my Direct Debit failed, with the request to get in contact with them to reconfirm my bank details. So I did get in contact and reconfirmed my details, and made sure that in the next month there was definitely enough money in my account. Strangely enough the Direct Debit failed again for a third successive month. I probably should have called NatWest by then but I didn’t.

Instead I called Orange again, waited a month, and saw the Direct Debit fail again, after which Orange send me another email. So I called NatWest first instead this time. They told me something that both amazed me, pissed me off, and confused me. Apparently (according to NatWest) it’s common practice to not allow a Direct Debit with the same “reference number” after two failed Direct Debits under that “reference number”. So I called Orange again to get me fully reconnected.

Now at this moment they had only downgraded my account to a basic account, without a second phone line (VOIP line), so my 30 minute phone call was mainly to A) make sure that they changed their reference number (which they where supposed to by NatWest) so that the next Direct Debit would be a success, and B) to get my phone line reconnected. After a lot of confusing arguments back and forward with the barely understandable Indian guy I had to give up and hope that they changed the reference number. Getting my second line reinstated proved impossible so I settled for a month without our land line.

Imagine my surprise when the next day (yesterday) I got an email from Orange informing me that my account had been closed. I got in contact in the evening, with another guy in India, eventually managed to get a local British support member of their “escalation” department on the line who explained to me that they had literally already closed my Orange account, removed the broadband from my line, and made me an ex-customer. According to her I could reapply for Orange after my Direct Debit had been cleared, but I had to sign up as a new customer, under a new package.

So who is to blame here? Orange for not changing the reference number? Or NatWest for canceling those Direct Debits after the second try, and not letting me know they where doing this? All I know is that I (the customer) has fallen victim even though I did I he could in the last 2 months to resolve the issue. I have probably also spend quite a bit of money on calling to both their service centers and ended up with the loss of home broadband for probably at least 3 weeks. 

I’m now deciding on what new broadband provider to apply for, as it seems that Orange already cleared the line completely, ready for a new provider to take up the space. I’m looking at O2 broadband as they can give me “up to 16mbps” for only £10 a month (I am a O2 mobile customer so I get discount). Alternatively I am thinking of getting Be Broadband, but that’s more expensive for speeds that I might not even get.