Mobile phones are a lifestyle issue. I hate them! The screens are always too small (unles you're happy carrying a miniature TV in your pocket), the keyboards are fiddly, the text recognition feature wreaks havoc with your spelling and it actually manages to hinder rather than speed up your texting. They always cut out when you're on a train in the middle of a really important conversation and they always ring when you're driving.

I use mine for business. I use Virgin Mobile as a provider because I like the brand. They have cheap, reliable phones which still look stylish and their pay-as-you-go flexibility appeals to me because my use varies from month to month.

Ok, I know I sound like an ad for them but I need to explain why I have one.

So on Monday I was working from home...normally it's a full-on meetings day. A couple of incoming calls on my mobile... nothing too serious. About 5.00pm I tried to ring out and I couldn't. Being at home I fished out my account, dialled up the number printed there using my landline (because of course you CANNOT use the mobile to ring the Virgin help line, every number is barred!) and I asked to find out what's happening. I pay by direct debit each month and I know the bill had been paid so I was certain it was a tech problem.

Turns out it wasn't. I recently changed addresses. One of the statements had been returned as undeliverable. So Virgin, using its good customer service initiative, having taken my money (and continuing to do so) thought it prudent to bar my phone from calling out.

You know you ring up and you talk to a guy, let's call him Sean, and he sounds like he's doing you a favour talking to you and you can excuse that at 2.00am because, let's face it, it's hardly the most challenging job in the world and the boredom factor must be something unreal, except this was 5.00 pm and I was a little irate and maybe a nonchallant devil-may-care attitude would not, in this case, have been the best policy to adopt.

"You know we did this so you can call us," he explained like he was talking to a five year old. "What was the first thing you did when your phone was barred?"

Incredibly enough he did not treat this as an academic question but actually waited for an answer from me.

By the time I finished explaining that the phone was used for business purposes not social, that the account was being paid and that, essentially, they had stopped me from using a service I was paying for, that they had had at least four weeks if not longer to contact me and that they held my landline number and email address on record, he had began to sound a little less jokular and had started coming out with the "we do it to protect you" spiel.

It's no good talking to foot soldiers. You need to go straight to the top, so I asked to speak to the customer service manager, let's call him Steven.

It's all first name terms, very informal, at Virgin Mobile. The company oozes cool. Steven made a couple of mistakes: 1. He too gave me the spiel about doing it for my protection and 2. He lied to me. He explained that returned statements are taken very seriously as they may be used, should they fall in the wrong hands, to obtain credit under false pretenses.

Now let's stop here and think. The statement has been returned, unopened. So unless Steven was suggesting that someone at Virgin Mobile could behave in this way I don't know what else he could have been talking about. The phone had been reported neither lost nor stolen. So presumably I was still using it. The bill was still being paid out of my bank account. If Virgin Mobile has cancelled the direct debit in an attempt to protect I would have accepted that, but they thought it would be cool if they just barred the phone.

Now, as far as Steve's defence goes, the only statements that banks and credit card companies accept as proof of address are Council Tax bills, Utility bills and BT landnline bills. Then, Steven compounded his error further with the salesman's clincher: "I've done it."

Sorry Steven but unless you went to a Mickey Mouse bank you have not done it and saying it was for my protection is ludicrous at best.

Bearing in mind that the whole thing had occured BECAUSE they'd received one of my statements back as undeliverable I would have thought that the commonsensical thing to do was check the address. It was as I was talking to Steven that I happened to glance at the address on the statement in front of me and realise that they had missed part of it off at the beginning. Steven corrected it there and then and he did say, to his credit, that he understood how I felt. His training worked at least in this bit.

We ended the call and I went away and the more I thought about it the angrier I became. So I went back to my statement and got the email address for customer services and sent an email to Virgin Mobile explaining my reasons for being angry and how unsatisfied I was with the reply. The customer service email at Virgin Mobile is theteam@virginmobile.com. 'Cool' oozing here again. You send an email and you talk to the entire team. Singularly or collectively is unclear, maybe the team is singular, who really knows?


Anyway, calls to Virgin Mobile's 789 number are charged at a flat rate of 10p no matter how, long you talk for. They could, I suppose make it free. It's their network and their phones but the 10p charges, I guess, must mount up over the course of a year, so they don't.

I said in my email that after 20 minutes of my time wasted I wanted a refund of the 20p for the two calls I had made (as a matter of principle) and I wanted a decent explanation. I did add that as email is not secure they should feel free to call me to verify I was who I said I was and that the issue was real.

Now call me pedantic but when you have a customer complaint issue on your hands and you reply to it you make sure that what you send out is literate and numerate. This is what I received (and for those of you out there who will question the legality of this, emails are communication that is in the public domain).

Hi David,
Thanks for your email to Virgin Mobile about your phone number being barred and your address not being updated. We're sorry to hear that your phone number had been barred. We can understand that this would've been a huge inconvenience to you. We can understand that you need your phone for business reasons, and we wouldn't want to loose you as a customer. Virgin Mobile pride itself on it's security and for this reason before we can advise you further on this, we'd need you to either contact our team on one of the number's below to answer a couple of questions first, or email us back from your account online at virginmobile.com with your Virgin number. Once this has been done we can look into this further for you and advise you further on this We hope that this matter is resolved for you as soon as possible. If there's anything else we can help you with, just reply to this email. You can also give us a call on 789 from your Virgin Mobile phone ? it's just 100p, no matter how long you talk for. Or, you can call us on 0845 6000 789 from a fixed line phone. These calls are charged at local rate. And just so you know, we're making some changes to our website over the next couple of weeks. It'll have a new and improved look, and it'll be quicker and easier to use too! The first time you look online, we'll ask you to register a couple of details, even if you've used our site before - but don't worry, it won't take a second. Just click on Create Your Account and you'll be up and running! How did we do? If you'd like to give us some feedback, just click on the link below and fill in our online questionnaire. We promise to use your answers to make our service the best it can be. click here to complete the survey.
Kind regards,
Chris Purdom Virgin Mobile

The eagle-eyed amongst you will catch an outbreak of what Lynn Truss, in her book, Eats, Shoots and Leaves, calls 'printer's apostrophe' and calls seem to be 100p, instead of 10p and there are a few instances of third person singular in the Simple Present tense not quite conforming with the verb structure...but hey, the team talked!

Now we all make mistakes. And usually errors like this just bring a smile to my lips, a reassurance that we are all mortals and even a cool-factor oozing corporation like Virgin Mobile is not beyond them. Except in this case it became indicative of their attitude which was sloppy! And it began to grate.

So on Tuesday, after receiving the reply I rang 789 and spoke to Natasha. Now Virgin Mobile girls are everything the guys aren't. They manage to sound cool, competent (even if they aren't) and friendly.

Natasha didn't know much about my account except what was on the notes but it appeared that I needed to talk to Accounts and they work 9.00am -5.oopm and at 5.30pm, when I had rang, they had all gone home for the day.

Oops! Is it me or had the email made no mention of that SMALL detail whatsoever?

Having just spent another 10p I asked if someone could call me to discuss why my phone had been barred from making calls.

Sure, What time?

Well, how about between 9.00am and 5.00pm on my mobile.

No problem, someone will call you tomorrow.

Now…guess what?

N-o-o-n-e called!

So, tonight I called again. This time I got Lucy. I had to yet again explain why I was calling, “that’s right your phone was barred,” she said.

Phones are barred for one of two reasons. They are stolen or they haven’t paid the bill. I t may have been my imagination but it sounded like Lucy had already made up her mind and it was the latter with me.

Of course by the time I had finished explaining the issue she was a little less judgmental and a lot more friendly. Accounts are apparently busy guys. Tech guys get back to you within 24 hours. Accounts may take as long as 72 hours, which gives them. I suppose until Friday, 9th.

I used to be with Virgin Mobile because of their customer service. Admittedly I have not had occasion to use it for some time.

I am going to get an explanation and I am going to get my phonecalls refunded and I am already shopping for another telephone provider.

As a consumer that is the only power I have and I will exercise it.