Lingo - Primus Telecommunications ripoff, defective meachandise, service, reps McLean Internet
I signed up for service early November. When I received my box, it didn't work. I called numerous times, and every time was supplied with a different reason as to why it didn't work. Finally, I was told the box wasn't working properly. (aha!) I asked if they would send me a new box and they said they wouldn't; that they were going to try to fix it. When I asked how long it might be, I was told that they weren't sure. I returned my box, yet I still had not received a refund, so I contacted the company early December. I was told my refund was on its way, and that it would be sent via my debit card. I gave my new debit card number to the rep, because I was told they would process my refund though it. Instead, I was charged 39.95! When I called, they said it was a cancellation fee. Nevermind that I was told when I cancelled that the fee was 9.95, nevermind that I cancelled within the period of time specified that I should NOT be charged the fee.
When I called last time, I was told my refund was on its way. Now I am being told they are looking for my box, in spite of the fact I was never told that when I called last time, and in spite of the fact that I have a tracking slip. I talked to a woman named Mary Bakangan, who said she couldn't help me until they found the box. She said they couldn't even return the 39.95 fee, even after she admitted it wasn't a valid charge since I had cancelled within the month's period.
After almost a month of not hearing back from them, and knowing it would be futile to call them, I finally filed a dispute with my bank. That is the only way I was able to get a refund. Lingo is a rip off and a waste of time.
Lea
Eureka, Illinois
U.S.A.
sorry, allowing you to give a competitors name would instigate others to just file against their competition, to only come back later to suggest their company your comments on this policy are welcome! CLICK here to see why Rip-off Report, as a matter of policy, deleted either a phone number, link or e-mail address from this Report.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Scott
Sanbruno,California,
U.S.A.
How to deal with Primus-Lingo
#2Consumer Suggestion
Sun, March 20, 2005
Fiancee and I were discussing on past companies to search for here, and it hit us to try Lingo and sure enough, it pulled up 18 complaints.
First off, I recommend NOT giving them any new credit card number. They can credit back to the one you cancel. Canceled cards cant be charged to, but can be credited back to. This we did last year.
Call your bank, and have them do a chargeback for non service and charging your card without your authorization. By what you stated above, this sounds exactly what they TRIED doing to us. Most banks will chargeback for bad product or non service.
Make Primus send a call tag to get their own box back. Dont pay for shipping.
What I said above is what we did to get our money back. Primus-Lingo tried ripping us off every way they could and lost. Ill tell you below what happened, then actually file a complaint lator once I look up the invoices.
Back in August my fiancee and I moved in together, mostly becasue we had a baby on the way and both use the net frequently and since voice over modem in NY worked great, I thought it be the same here in CA. I was very wrong, least with Primus. They had a deal, $39.95 with free box and service for 3 months, unlimited long distance, then after $9.95 a month. Box came, installed everything just like I did in NY, and already had problems. Service was out 95% of the time. Anyone who called me would get message my number asnt in service, or my fiancee trying to call me had no dial tone. Box was defective, to the point smoke filled the apartment and had fire department came and discovered it was the Lingo box. This isnt all, and not all in this order. Something else happened. I got onto their website and found the call detail report. Talk about a company faking records. The call detail had numbers on it from before I even signed up for the service and Lingo kept denying that their system can make this mistake and that I or fiancee had to have made the calls and forgot we did. Funny, how if I have a lease for my apartment, starting August 2004, a receipt for start of service from Lingo starting 2004, that Im able to have made phone calls from this apartment from march 2004? Lol, I was living in NY back then. They even were charging me per minute and trying to charge my Credit card for it for local calls that never even made the connection. I stopped the card and bank did charge back. Now of all things, I thought it was over. Come January of 2005, and I sure as hell dont know how they did it, but they got my new card number and started billing my new card for phone service and at this time, everything was sent back, (They paid for call tag) Only thing I can think of, is possably Primus used another service and obtained my new CC this way. Called my bank, stopped the card, and did a second chargeback. Come March of 2005, I get a letter from their collections agency that my card was refused and that I owe them $19.95 or my service will be turned off. I wont repeat what I said to them on the phone, as funny and childish as it was, but told them to shut off the service (btw, it took them 40 minutes on their toll free number to realize I had no service, which I knew, but I felt good makig them pay for phone call) Oh, they actually told me they needed my new card number for account verification. Anyways, it was about time to eat, so hung up on them and awating to see if anything else surfaces.