I'm having a hard time grokking something

[kindlekitten]

Maybe you all can help? I have a several hundred dollar overpayment at the phone company, more or less deliberately. For the fourth or fifth month in a row I've had my services suspended for non pay ment(sorry I'm on a phone).

How can I get it through these idiots heads that there IS money in the account/paid to them, whatever?

About five years ago I travelled for work all of the time, this went on for about four or five years. I was constantly being shut off when I was on the road. When they finally got their heads out of their fourth point of contact, they sent me checks totaling a little over four grand. That was nice at the time but I'd just rather use it now.

Anyone have any suggestions here?

[poohbear_nc]

Many companies employ non-accountants in their billing departments - when they see a figure in your account that is not zero, the automatically assume that it is a balance due - ignoring that little negative sign, or red ink.

OR - and I've seen this a lot, the company does NOT apply the credit balance automatically to pay an outstanding bill. Your account balance is a credit, but contains unpaid bills alongside your overpayment. You have to tell them each month to apply the overpayment to the new outstanding bill.

[cromag]

I don't know if phone companies care anymore, but try sending a letter of explanation/complaint to a specific supervisor in Customer Service, with a copy to the Utilities Commission in your state. They used to pay attention to that.

[kindlekitten]

Ugh. I do auto pay from my bank, not from the company, there's no way I'm going to let any entity reach into my bank account. I started this specifically because I was traveling all of the time, anywhere from a week to three months and there was no way I could monitor my bills. It's crazy that I get these warnings that my services are about to be cut off, gets me spun up, and who knows what this does to my credit rating?

[daffy4u]

KK, do you absolutely have to keep phone service with them (I'm assuming this is a land line)? There are other options:

- Cell phone only
- VoIP (I use Ooma)
- A Google Voice number forwarded to any phone you choose

[kindlekitten]

Actually it's not even my phone, I've gone totally cell with that, it's my internet. As far as I know, I've no other options. Cable I know for sure is out, they won't come down my road. I tried satellite but had to use a weird company, they became unreliable and cost prohibitive. I can get service using a hot spot but that sends my charges through the roof.

I'm certainly open for suggestions if anyone can come up with anything else, :-) thanks Bilbo!

[daffy4u]

Is it possible for you to have the phone company bill a credit card monthly? You can then set up an auto-pay to the credit card from your bank.

[kindlekitten]

That's part of the struggle. I did that once abd got cleaved out. I have auto pay with my bank. .

[Angst]

Originally Posted by kindlekitten

That's part of the struggle. I did that once abd got cleaved out. I have auto pay with my bank. .

Try making an automatic payment of 1 cent. It may trigger an automatic payment due calculation by the phone company's computer. Hopefully, it will credit you for the over payment when it re-calculates the amount owed.