I don't understand why you put up with them charging you so many times. After the second fraudulent charge, I'd just deal with my credit card company directly. Call them up and have the charges reversed. You get your money back and they get punished by their card company for the fraudulent charge.
If more people did this, instead of waiting on hold for hours to fight with customer service for your own money back, the ISP would likely lose their merchant account for their fraudulent activity.
Edit: one other note when cancelling, make sure to take down the date, time and operator name & number during your interactions and note what was said. When I've had trouble with managing accounts, referencing that information strengthened my case dramatically.
I have a Google Doc that I keep for all these notes. While I'm on hold, I open up the doc and get it ready. Be clear that you're taking notes and they'll take the conversation more seriously too.
I think they had my debit card details rather than credit (foolish) on the third occasion I wanted to make sure they left me alone and it seems I was at least successful in getting them to delete my card details from their system.
After that they just sent demands, as they had no card to charge.
But yes, should have just called HSBC and told them the charges were fraudulent, I know better now!
Here in the UK most large (and many small) organisations let you pay bills (one off or recurring) by credit card, debit card, direct debit, bank transfer (and occasionally cheque in the post). Some will charge a small fee for credit cards, but most won't.
I don't use a debit card much but I heard that you don't get as many consumer protects with debit cards as you do with credit cards. If you're going to pay bills, for many reasons, use a credit card instead of debit cards.
You have virtually NO consumer protection with a debit card. Once the money is gone, it is gone.
This is why merchant acquirers charge a flat rate of a few pence for debit card transactions, and an extortionate percentage for credit card transactions - chargeback risk. Cannae do with a debit card without bumping into Dante and his buddy in their digs first.
> You have virtually NO consumer protection with a debit card. Once the money is gone, it is gone.
Only if it's a card-present debit transaction (i.e., you entered a PIN). If you use your debit card and don't enter a PIN, it's automatically run as a credit card, and you have the same protections.
There are some protections in the UK for debit card use, but less than for credit card. Credit Card use has more legal protections because it is an instrument of debt, and the CC provider is legally a party to the debt, which comes with a whole bunch of responsibilities. Debit cards are protected by some legal stuff and the banking code.
Usually they are recording the call anyway (or reserving the right to). A robot normally mentions it at the beginning of the call. I'm no lawyer, but maybe this is enough to give you permission to record your own copy?
If both parties are aware that the call may be recorded, then either party may record it. That is covered by the boilerplate "this call may be recorded" language that pretty much every call center uses.
afaik Europe doesn't have the same rules regarding chargebacks and it's much harder to successfully dispute a charge there.
Chargebacks only work the way they do in the U.S. due to regulatory requirements that the card companies allowed to go into law because they'd figured out how to profit any time a chargeback was filed.
Chargebacks in the UK are protected by law, where credit is concerned, because the CC company is a party to the debt they are legally compelled to return the money to you pending an investigation.
I don't know about the rest of Europe but here in the UK it's just as easy as the US and just as black and white.
If more people did this, instead of waiting on hold for hours to fight with customer service for your own money back, the ISP would likely lose their merchant account for their fraudulent activity.
Edit: one other note when cancelling, make sure to take down the date, time and operator name & number during your interactions and note what was said. When I've had trouble with managing accounts, referencing that information strengthened my case dramatically.
I have a Google Doc that I keep for all these notes. While I'm on hold, I open up the doc and get it ready. Be clear that you're taking notes and they'll take the conversation more seriously too.