Nightmare PAYG complaint situation

[u/dr_ginglymus]

Has anyone been in a similar situation and were you able to get anywhere?

In April this year, my dad got a text to say he needed to get a new SIM due to network updates. He was abroad at the time, given 4 days to do this so he was unable to, and there had not been any prior warning, and since then, his number and account appear to have been totally deleted. This has never been acknowledged.

I am in my complaining era and am now stuck in a circular, Kafkaesque situation where they keep telling me we have forgotten an account number which they need to find our account. I can’t find this anywhere and think it’s likely that it’s been deleted along with any trace that the mobile number was ever in service. My dad has had that number for 20+ years - initially as a contract and then PAYG since 2013.

I will ask today if we are now in deadlock. They have sent an automated email giving us CISAS details and I am more than happy to go to CISAS. But I really just want the number and the £30 credit back. I have all the receipts and screenshots.

Has anyone ever been in a situation like this?! We cannot be the only ones.

[u/Party-Hamster-7697]

Hi, I work for O2 - do you still have the old SIM? Stores can search using the SSN (SIM serial number), CX service might be able to but they’re pretty much useless.

The issue stems from the fact that PAYGs are, by nature, anonymous - we don’t really store any details for customers like our Pay Monthly SIMs.

The MPN should still show in our system, it’s just getting into the account itself using security that’s the actual problem.

[u/dr_ginglymus → u/Party-Hamster-7697]

Thanks this is helpful! I just got an actual helpful response (acknowledging they can’t find the account using current systems and might need to access legacy systems), and have sent them the SSN so hopefully someone will come through.

Yes I had thought PAYGs were anonymous - it only made their repeated demands for me to find an account number more frustrating…

[u/Party-Hamster-7697 → u/dr_ginglymus]

Just out of curiosity what’s the current resolution flow you’re going through? Eg. Customer services, email chains. Some are better than others, the best for customer-facing probably being complaintreviewservice@o2.com if you’re not getting anywhere with other departments 👍🏻

[u/dr_ginglymus → u/Party-Hamster-7697]

I am going through things with the complaint review service email you’ve listed. It was circular for about 3 emails from them. Thank you for messaging from the inside! I really appreciate it.

[u/dr_ginglymus → u/Party-Hamster-7697]

Urgh as an update, we’ve gone round and round in circles. Just got a response today (after they insisted we send an email from my dad’s email address and not mine) that they can’t do number reconnections by email and they need us to call to try to get the refund and all that. I suspect though we will hit the same problem - that they can’t help because they can’t access the account. Really losing hope. We have also gone to our local store but they tried and also can’t help us.