I was completely taken in. I thought I’d better just pay. I didn’t want a big court case

SECONDARY school teacher Siobhán O’Connor, 47, from Dooradoyle, Limerick, was at home during the summer holidays last year when she got a call from a number she didn’t recognise.

‘They started off the call by saying, “Hi, Siobhán, you’re an Eircom customer”, so I assumed they were Eircom,’ she says. ‘I was completely taken in by it. They listed all their prices compared to what I was paying so I thought it was a good deal. Of course, I was already in a contract that I couldn’t get out of.’

Ms O’Connor later realised that the Yourtel charges were on top of her Eircom bundle. ‘I started contacting them to see if I could get out of it but emails weren’t answered and I couldn’t get them on the phone. When I spoke to them eventually I spoke to a guy from Eastern Europe who was very pleasant but just couldn’t help me out.’

She also didn’t have all the details on the contract and a Yourtel rep sidestepped her request to find a way to end her contract.

‘The longest part of the conversation was him saying I was going to be put through to a questionnaire about the customer service. He said, “I hope you’re going to give me a good report because I’ve got a family to feed.” I couldn’t believe it – all this, when I had called to cancel the service. It was unbelievable so I put the phone down on him.’

Soon afterwards, Yourtel put Ms O’Connor on a two-year contract that there was no way out of. She contacted Eircom but they told her she was stuck with the deal. ‘That was one thing that struck me afterwards because I always trusted Eircom as a good company.

‘I thought I’d better just pay this because I don’t want a big court case or something. Because the amount of money was reasonable, I thought it was better to pay than to panic about not having paid. Yourtel were pointing out to me that I had signed myself into this so it was my fault. I hadn’t a leg to stand on so I thought I would have to suck it up.’

With so many attempts needed just to get through to someone in the Yourtel office, Ms O’Connor got worn out. ‘I just gave up after a while because I was only paying about €12 or €15 a month and I got really, really tired of trying to make contact. If it had been any more, I would have fought harder but I felt it wasn’t a huge amount so it wasn’t worth fighting.’

Ms O’Connor said she had no idea where she should turn for help. ‘I found it hard to get any information at the time from anyone,’ she said.

‘One day out of the blue I got a letter saying that they were in the wrong and offered to cancel. I wrote them a letter immediately. I heard no more until I got a cheque for €72.

‘It was less than I paid them probably but I was so happy to be out of it.’