In the Spring of I experienced problems with my alarm system. It took forever to convince Monitronics to send someone out to look at it. When he got here, he said it was so old he wasnt even familiar with it. He recommended replacing it, but had no authority to give me a quote, saying I would have to call Monitronics to get a price. When I called Monitronics, they said they would have to send someone out to give me a quote.
In August of the equipment installed at my home failed completely. If plugged in, it would go into a loud siren mode. When I called for service, the response was that it was not a problem because they werent getting signalled that there was an alarm at the house. At that time, I disconnected the alarm equipment and faxed in a request to have monitoring cease immediately.
I believe I was offered a choice of buying a new system and signing up with Monitronics for three more years, but I do not recall the details of that offer, because I was so disappointed with the so-called service at this point, that I wished to cancel completely.
I had another company install an alarm system at my house a week later. I then called to have my account cancelled completely. I was told that since my contract had automatically renewed until December, that I would have to keep paying the monthly fee until then, and also that the only way to cancel was in witing.
September 11, I sent a letter of cancellation to Monitronics.in it, I specifically requested written confirmation of the cancellation of my account.
November 12, I had not yet received any confirmation of the cancellation. I spoke with a customer service representative who identified herself as Denise. She confirmed that my contract would be cancelled as of December and I would receive no more charges after my contract expired in December. She led me to believe that she was actually looking at the physical letter I had sent.
February, I realized that my checking account was still be automatically debited for a monthly fee for a service I have not received for over six months. I wrote a second letter to complain about the situation. I have since made several calls to Monitronics, and have found that there is apparently no procedure for dealing with (ex-) customer complaints such as mine. There was refusal to allow me to speak to anyone of any authority, there was denial that a letter was received in September, and I was even told that sine I had not sent the letter via certified mail, I was out of luck. That is not a practice I find that I normally have to follow. I did get someone to admit they received my fax in August, so they admitted they were not providing me any service.
For one call I made in April I held the line until I was able to speak with someone who was apparently a supervisor for the customer service department. She insisted that there was no record of ever having received a letter, there was no record of my having called in November, that there was never a Denise working for her department, and finally she told me that in January I had agreed to renew my contract for 9 months, not the standard 12, and therefore any cancellation should have been received in July. I dont believe that claim for one second!
Now after writing multiple letters of complaint, they are telling me that my contract will terminate in October but that I have to keep paying until then. They are threatening to send the bills to a collection agency. I have previously had a stellar credit rating, and am not looking forward to the harrassment they are going to inflict upon me. On top of that, I still have received nothing in writing that confirms for me that the contract will terminate, so I have no reason to believe they will hold up any kind of verbal promise whatsoever.
A
Mundelein, Illinois
U.S.A.
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