SOUNDING OFF: Ripped off? Stunned by good value?  Write, blog or text your experience to us

Months ago Gerry Hogan began receiving a texted quiz several times a week. “I just deleted them each time,” he writes. “I replied to one of them asking them not to send any more but they continued to come. I also noticed that I was having to top up my mobile account more frequently than before.”

Last week he contacted Vodafone about his account and was told that the quiz texts were responsible. “I was being charged €2.50 for every one received and since December 6th this came to €75. Vodafone told me that the company sending the quiz was Zamano and gave me a number to text the word ‘stop’ to. I did and it worked,” he writes.

He was also told to e-mail his complaint to Regtel. “I did and a reply came to say an investigation was underway.” He asks how is the public to know that there is a special code word for having such texts stopped? “An advertiser that advertises by e-mail will at least have an unsubscribe facility attached,” he says.

No go with the Flow

James O’Leary got in touch with us in connection with a long-standing problem he had with eFlow, which manages the tolling system on the M50. He received notification that his “eFlow tag” would be delivered in the last week of last August. In the middle of September he received notification of how to activate his tag, although it had never arrived and he had contacted the company to tell them so.

Having never received the tag, he then cancelled his subscription and requested that his account be closed and the €38 he had paid to the company be returned to him. “This has never happened despite multiple e-mails and telephone conversations on my part, and multiple reassurances on the part of eFlow’s customer service representatives.”

He says the “galling part” of the problem is that he no longer owns the car that was registered to the account and has since emigrated, but “they still cannot rectify this problem despite repeated attempts on my part”.

We contacted eFlow and a spokesman said our reader had been issued a full refund. “We apologise for the delay in receiving this payment, the cause of which is due to a backlog processing refunds. These delays have been halved in recent weeks and will be resolved fully,” he said.

He accepted that there had been instances where “customer service has not been up to the required levels” and said that in “response to failings, we initiated some weeks ago a strategic review to resolve matters to our customers’ satisfaction. Within a very short timeframe, we expect to have delivered a positive and improved outcome for our customers.”

Meds on hols

On a recent three-night visit to Carcassonne in the south of France, a reader called Mary decided to see if she could buy Actonel medication for osteoporosis, which normally costs her €58 for one month’s supply. “I was pleasantly surprised to find I could buy the exact same 35mg at a cost of €91 for three months’ supply – this is just €30 odd per month. Needless to say I stocked up.”

She was also in Belfast recently, where she was able to buy protein remover tablets for hard gas permeable lenses which her daughter uses. “These are priced €19 in my local pharmacy but £8.70 [€9.80] in Boots in Belfast for a packet of 10 tablets. In fact, all the other cleansers for those type of lenses were less than half price in Boots and cheaper again in Sainsburys. Of course I bought loads.”