Wow... suddenly stonewalled.

Will preface this by saying I've not tried to call. I find it crazy to have to call an online-only business - and when they've made that their only contact method, it's not a freephone number (like my new ISP - thanks Be!)

Story in brief:

30th Dec: After six years with PlusNet, saw an offer on Be. Decided to take the plunge. Signed up for Be, requested MAC key from PlusNet (which you have to call for - except their call system was broken. Was fixed when I tried again, an hour later.) Contacted PlusNet online to ask about their 10 day notice period.

31st Dec: Got reply to query: "Your notice starts from the date you request your MAC key. Once you have migrated away, we would either contact you for any outstanding payments or refund any overpayment on your account."

4th Jan: Got MAC key. Register it with Be.

8th Jan: Confirm with PlusNet about how to contact them to confirm my account is closed, as it will be after my 10 day notice period. Discover from both Be and PlusNet that my switchover date is predicted to be the 12th. Also, got rebilled for the next month from PlusNet, the full £21.99.

9th Jan: Got response: "Any notification will be from your new ISP, we will then refund any over payment once the migration has completed."

Mostly good so far. Discovered Be have online chat, in addition to their support line being freephone. Nice touches. PlusNet are handling the closure nicely though, too.

11th Jan: Turn router off at wall.

12th Jan: Get home and discover my line's been switched (as predicted), plug my new router in, everything works immediately. Look forward to the refund for 27 days.

14th Jan: Get a lot of automated e-mails from PlusNet - all my account is deleted, including my login. There goes access to the ticketing system! Two e-mails in particular... at 15:01: "Please be advised that your account has now been cancelled and no further paymenst are required." Makes me wonder if they're going to try and con me out of 2 days of refund.

15:02: "We're emailing you to let you know that as your cancellation request has now been placed. Your cancellation will take place on 21/01/2010."

Ah, no, they're going to try and con me out of 9 days. Awesome.

'Sales' is now all I can e-mail - but since from the webcams I remember they sit a few metres away, I e-mail them to make sure the refund is from the 12th. Am told the unhelpful, "You will need to contact customer services to discuss this matter as they will be able to activate you account." Huh? I reply. That was the 14th, no response yet (29th).

22nd: Disheartened by the lack of reply, I see Mand put the e-mail address '[email protected]' on these forums. I e-mail that to ask for help.

Today, 29th: No response from any e-mail. No refund, not even from the 21st. Am very happy on Be - less than a third of the price, unlimited, uncapped (as opposed to heavy throttling with a... 15GB? cap.) But I'm owed a refund, and am being ignored.

Your first mistake was not to ask for the account to be downgraded to dialup PAYG which would have meant you would still be able to receive mail on all your Plusnet mailboxes (that stays active permanently provided you regularly collect your mail). It would have also meant you would have still had access to the ticketing system.

It may be possible for one of the Comms team to reactivate the account as dialup PAYG but you'd have to then recreate the mailboxes.

I don't think your post here will be picked up before Monday.

Honestly, I thought this was the default behaviour, and was a little disappointed when everything was just deleted. Once it happened though, I pretty much accepted it - I never used the mailboxes, and it's only the ticketing system and my past tickets I've missed. I did also look around the site and saw no mention of a PAYG account, but I may have just missed it.

Cheers for letting me know that they're not around on weekends though - I guess I figured they would be; I have vague memories of PN staff being on usenet every day. I'll bump this on Monday to see if it can get some attention.

You didn't miss dialup PAYG when you looked - it isn't there. It is one of those things you have to know about from elsewhere.

Did you have any referrals? If you keep the account open you can still get payment for them ( a payment is made when the amount owed goes over £5).

Your first mistake was not to ask for the account to be downgraded to dialup PAYG which would have meant you would still be able to receive mail on all your Plusnet mailboxes (that stays active permanently provided you regularly collect your mail). It would have also meant you would have still had access to the ticketing system.

Should this information not be supplied to anyone requesting a MAC as a matter of course? I'm sure this isn't the first complaint of this nature.

It is one of those things you have to know about from elsewhere.

Should it remain so?

IMHO, the default to remove ALL of the Customer's details and close the account on completion of migration out is correct. Unless the customer explicitly requests something else, PlusNet would be wrong to retain account details. It is also likely that this would contravene the Data Protection Act but IANAL.

Why do you have the expectation that PlusNet SHOULD provide an enduring mail and Portal access account? It is to their credit that they do this but I disagree that they have an enduring obligation to do it or indeed to publicise the service.

Only my opinion ....

I don't think they should do it by default, but I think they ought to tell people of its existence. Too many people have only found out too late that they could have elected to keep their e-mail.

Sorry, I just want to make sure as the topic seems to be getting derailed: I guess I have two complaints, but neither is that they closed my account.

One is that they've completely prevented me from contacting them online; the other (much bigger) complaint is that in addition to receiving no contact the moment my account was closed, and despite two confirmations otherwise, I've not received the refund I'm owed.

No, I didn't have any referrals. I never would have used my account again, it would just have been very useful to use their ticketing system to sort out this refund.