I’ve just received a phone call from BT which I found really rather ominous. It seems, rather than sending out red reminder bills, they now pick up the phone and call to verbally harangue their customers about late payment.
It just happened that I recalled I’d not paid the latest bill this morning, and would have got around to it this weekend, but my hackles have very much been raised by this, I feel, rather sinister change in BT process. They argue (as I questioned that I’d not received the red bill) that some people complain they don’t receive them. Presumably they’ve been trialing this elsewhere, and have seen improved payments as a result. I imagine too the cost of calling people is cheaper for them than posting a letter 
But I just don’t like being phoned up and talked to like I was back at School. Whilst it’s good that BT offer a £12 discount if you pay by direct debit (which is better than many companies who just suggest it’s more ‘convenient’ and don’t pass on savings or encouragement for my giving them my bank details. My Zen is doing this right now. Sorry, keep paying the credit card charges. It works fine for me), I’ve been left feeling like a naughty boy, and wishing I had somewhere else I could take my business.
OK, they’re entitled to chase their bills. I have to do the same with late paying customers, but just over two weeks is not (in my opinion) sufficient time before they start threatening “action” over the phone. Sure it’s been “deferred” because I’m a “good customer”, but the threat was there. And that my bill was only produced on the 13th September, and 16 days later I’m being implicitly threatened by a real live person at the end of the phone. That they then suggested “we can take payment now” was even more bizarre: Don’t ever give your bank details over the phone to unsolicited callers. Call them back so that you definitely know who’s calling (even if caller-id gives a clear clue).
Some folk might like the ‘personal’ nature of all of this. I don’t. I wish I had a genuine choice about who supplied telephone services. To some extent I do, but given I depend on a consistent telephone and ADSL service, I can’t (right now) uproot to another provider. For all their faults, it does work all the time at the right price. But BT have, to me, demonstrated they’re getting more aggressive in the competitive marketplace they’re now in, but in a bad way, that has left a very sour taste in my mouth. And I’m a “good customer”.
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