Orange - "sorry that deal isn't for existing Customers!!"

[darrensen]

Dear all,

Wanted to voice my thoughts regarding Orange.

My contract was due to expire in Dec 2006 and i've finally decided to upgrade to the SPV M3100. Went into the Orange store to see my friend and he said he could do it on upgrade for £100. I know that i can get it cheaper so i tried in over the phone.

Been with Orange for 7 or 8 years and go through this painful process of arguing every year! The deal i wanted was £25, 275 mins 750 texts on 12 month contract. The 1st price they offered me was £140!!!! bl00dy jokers!!! They offer the same deal on the web but they said sorry that's for new customers only! Then i got them down to £100 but to get it to £50 i had to do a 18 month contract!

So i said cant be bothered to argue with them for this 7th or 8th year running so i'm off to O2, disconnet my handset. There is absolutly nothing stopping me from going onto their site and ordering that phone at the price i wanted. But becuase they ticked me off so much this time, i'm not gonna go back to Orange! It's just like that Bank advert "so new customers only".......

Why do they treat current customers so badly? Why make the customer go through buying a new phone on their website? Why make inconvenience them by having their number changed???

Orange need to take a rethink with their upgrades process before more customers leave. I wont be recommending them anymore.

Thanks for your time.

Darren

[dave87]

Orange CS has gone down the toilet.

Luckily I made my parents jump ship before we had cause to deal with them (mainly because we got a better deal, but CS was a concern).

I'm with Vodafone, and I have gotta say, the CS has been excellent. The billing team, on the other hand, can't quite add up. All sorted with one quick phone call though

[Andeh13]

I used to adore orange, but their CS is shocking. Spend an hour waiting on the phone then your connected to india.

[monkeyville]

I prefer Three to Orange and i think that says it all

[Spud1]

^^ fully agree with monkeyville..I was with orange at the end of last year, and had a problem with my handset (nokia 6280) as it didnt have all the features promised on their website (like active standby). It turned out that orange had removed those features from their firmware because their customisations made those components unstable.

Annoying yes but with any 'real' phone operator I would expect to be able to just change to a different phone model of the same or lesser value - but oh no not with Orange. Then only way for my to get a new phone would be to cancel my current contract and take out a brand new one with them! Meaning another new number, more wasted time and stress..

After that I left orange and moved to three - who I have actually been very impressed with. Apart from the whole downgrading fiasco three have done nothing wrong yet after nearly 6 months..good phone, good coverage, good CS..but then they havn't been bought out by the french..yet.

[jamena]

I was told by someone at carphone warehouse that the trick was to downgrade your contract to a payg, get your PAC and then to start a new contract with the same company on the new good deal transferring your number back to the new contracts (this applied to a new deal with 3 though. I didn't go for it in the end but it could be worth a try. Companies will always try to screw you so you have find ways to screw them back. Same applies to almost any big business unfortunately. When you find a good company hold on tight!

[Flash]

I left Orange because of the same thing they have no loyalty.

[Apex]

I was told by someone at carphone warehouse that the trick was to downgrade your contract to a payg, get your PAC and then to start a new contract with the same company on the new good deal transferring your number back to the new contracts (this applied to a new deal with 3 though. I didn't go for it in the end but it could be worth a try. Companies will always try to screw you so you have find ways to screw them back. Same applies to almost any big business unfortunately. When you find a good company hold on tight!

Pritty much spot on.

Sadly orange are not alone in this, O2, Voda, Three and T-Mobile are all like it.

At the end of the day they look to see if keeping you is worth it to them and if the computer says no then it's no.

Am glad i no longer do this as a job.....

[Dreaming]

I've got 10 months left on my O2 contract 18 month contracts are not so fun

[dave87]

Heh, 18 month contract didn't particularly bother me - I got a great price plan as a result

[Dreaming]

It wouldn't bother me, except my phone is dead and it's only been 7 months or so. And they say the replacement will be a refurbished one, as it wouldn't be fair to give me a new one when other people who started at the same time will have a phone with 7 months wear and tear.

Will have to see though.

[jamena]

It wouldn't bother me, except my phone is dead and it's only been 7 months or so. And they say the replacement will be a refurbished one, as it wouldn't be fair to give me a new one when other people who started at the same time will have a phone with 7 months wear and tear.

Will have to see though.

This is also standard practice - check your contract. If you have insurance (rip off imo) then you could check that to see if that entitles you to a new phone? You could be lucky but I'd guess they're the same with refurbs...

Depending on the company your first 2 or 3 warranty replacements would be refurbs before they decied to try keep you happy with a new phone. Refurbs are usually in pretty good condition, just remember to at least reset the memory on your own phone before sending it back. Receiving a phone complete with numbers, photos, etc, straight from the shop is a bit weird! Occasionally they might offer you a different model of phone. I've received refurbs from 3 and vodafone before and vodafone tried to fob me off with a lower-spec, heavier, etc model than the one I'd sent away. A bit of "what what wha?!" got me a replacement in the same model soon enough.

[thestjohn]

If the phone really is dead, completely beyond economic repair, if you send it to the manufacturer under warranty they'll usually replace it with a new handset, or a refurb unit so good you'd have a job distinguishing it from a brand new one. Have had 2 brand new Nokia's and 1 spotless refurb Motorola through going direct to the manufacturer. Means spending time away from your phone, but hey, sometimes it's a good thing.

Back on the thread, Orange assign you one of five values on upgrade which determine the commission the seller receives. From one distributor, for example, if you are assigned the current Band 1 value the seller would receive £30 commission if they upgraded you on a 12 month contract, which is clearly not enough to pay for most phones at trade price. Even the maximum value possible, Band 5, only pays £140 for a 12 month upgrade. When you consider that a Nokia 6233 costs £166 trade from the same supplier, you can see how much Orange values its existing customers. There's always more in the pot for new customers, and they don't seem to care about devaluing long-standing but low spending customers.

But then again, maybe we should let the networks spend their money on making our tariffs cheaper and making their equipment work properly, instead of always demanding a new phone. Can't we just keep the one's we have a bit longer?

[monkeyville]

My phone breaks every 12 months so i need a new handset at the start of every contract. You often find that low end contracts (less than £35) get poor upgrade deals, but £45+ tariffs will be offered anything to get them to stay on. That has been my experience anyway.

[haloman]

...unless you're on O2, when you'll get a good retention deal no matter what. Okay, you won't get the latest phones if you're on £10/month, but you'll be offered something decent and get a reduction in the standard tariff. They are the kings of retention deals. That said, Three's deals are generally unbeatable at the moment - shame about the 18 month contracts and the bad reputation though.

[SHare]

I just pay as I go with tescos. I had a contract with Orange and got screwed every which way, never again.