EE and Virgin Media fined for overcharging customers who left contract early
By Josh White
Date: Friday 16 Nov 2018
(Sharecast News) - Ofcom has levied £13.3m in fines against EE and Virgin Media, it announced on Friday, for overcharging phone and broadband customers who wished to leave their contracts early.
The regulator said the penalties were the result of investigations into the early exit charges billed by both EE, part of BT; and Virgin Media, a brand of Liberty Global.
It said phone and broadband companies are allowed charge customers who decided not to see out the minimum term of their contracts, but under Ofcom rules, the charges must be made clear to customers, and could not make switching to another provider too costly.
Ofcom said its investigation found that both EE and Virgin Media failed to comply with the rules, because around 400,000 EE customers who ended their contracts early were over-billed, and customers ended up over-paying up to £4.3m.
Additionally, almost 82,000 Virgin Media customers were overcharged a total of just under £2.8m, with both companies failing to make sufficiently clear the charges customers would have to pay if they ended their contract early.
"EE and Virgin Media broke our rules by overcharging people who ended their contracts early," said Ofcom director of investigations and enforcement Gaucho Rasmussen.
"Those people were left out of pocket, and the charges amounted to millions of pounds."
Rasmussen called that situation unacceptable.
"These fines send a clear message to all phone and broadband firms that they must play by the rules, in the interests of their customers."
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