Double-charged twice on prepaid bill, can't get in contact with customer service via phone.

[Joe_Enterprise]

Hello. I have one of those pre-paid accounts that's $10.50/mo for an emergency phone I'm using throughout chemo. When I checked my bank account status, I noticed that Telus Mobility withdrew $10.50 from my account TWICE per payment each month ($10.50 x4 total instead of x2), but my Telus account only has 2 payments' worth of balance on it. I'm lower income and the only reason I have money at all right now is because of EI, so I'd prefer not to be double-charged since EI isn't forever and I'm unsure of the future as far as finances go between this COVID thing and my cancer stuff. I have tried to get in contact with customer service over the phone FOUR TIMES but regardless of what option I pick, I hear a recording and then the line hangs up on me. While I realize that most billing issues must be phoned in, that simply isn't an option due to this auto-hang-up feature being added to the customer service line. A bank statement can be provided to Telus showing this error, if necessary. I will happily do so by email, or the site's private messaging service if such a thing exists.

[BrandonT]

Hi @Joe_Enterprise ,

I am sorry you have had such a hard time trying to get in touch with TELUS Support. I have reported this issue for further investigation.

The only valid reason for the automated system to hang up is when its past the hours of operation, if this was not the case, then do know we are looking into resolving the issue.

As for being double billed, this is usually due to having 2 payment options selected.

• Automatic bank payments (setup on the customers end through their banking account)
• Auto-Top-up Account Balance
• Auto-Renew Plan

To save the most amount of time, I would suggest taking a look at your online bank account and confirming if you have automatic bill payments enabled for TELUS. If you do, you can disable this, and the issue is solved. If there is no automatic bill payments setup on your online banking, then you would either need to call TELUS, or speak to customer service using Live Chat (recommended based on your concerns). Ask the agent to check if both the Auto-Top Up account balance is enabled, and the Auto-Renew Plan is enabled. If so have them remove one of the payment options.  

How To: TELUS Live Chat Support

1. At the bottom of this page, click Contact us
2. Click on the purple box on the bottom right.
3. Click Mobility.
4. Click Yes, I am a Mobility customer.
5. Select a department.
6. Name
7. Contact Number - Just in case the live chat disconnects, we can call you right back.
   
   Suggestion: When an agent connects with you on Live Chat, just send them this link: https://forum.telus.com/t5/Mobility-Devices/Double-charged-twice-on-prepaid-bill-can-t-get-in-contac... to save some time having to re-type your concerns.

I hope you are able to get this issue resolved as soon as possible with the least inconvenience. 

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TELUS Employee & Neighbourhood Volunteer :black_small_square: Found this post helpful? Let others know by clicking [❤️ Like] or [Accepted Solution].

[Joe_Enterprise]

Oh, ha. So that's where the chat option is. Sadly, it seems to only be an AI with limited capabilities and is incapable of helping me with the issue. While my phone calls to the mobility line were during business hours, my fiddling with the bot was not... so maybe I just need to wait? As far as I can see, I just have the one "top-up" feature selected and do not have any other renewals on top of it. The bot also said that double-payments should disappear from my statement within a few days, but it's been longer than that in both cases, one of them being more than a month. I am unsure if it meant that this happens on its own, or after cancelling something. If I disable automatic bill payments via my bank account as you suggested, does that remove just ONE of the payments (making it a normal 1/mo instead of 2/mo), or does it remove the automatic payments altogether? If I do this, will I get my missing $21 back in some form? Thanks for taking the time to type things at me, regardless.

[BrandonT · Accepted solution]

Hi @Joe_Enterprise 

"Oh, ha. So that's where the chat option is."

Haha, yea the Live Chat feature is a little hidden. Feedback has been received, and hopefully it will be improved and easier to access in the near future. You can also use the Telus.com/livechat but I don't recommend it since this version does not allow to choose a department, resulting in being transferred and waiting again (if there is a wait time)

"Sadly, it seems to only be an AI with limited capabilities and is incapable of helping me with the issue."

Ah! I failed to mention in the previous post that it too has specific hours of operation. I would suggest trying again Monday to Sunday: 6:00 AM to 7:00 PM PST (I asked the AI - since I didn't know the COVID-19 hours of operation for the live chat). If you get the AI bot, just type the magic words "I want to speak to a agent". It will then ask you for the category of your call. Just click billing. If the AI tried to help you more, just say one more time "I want to speak to an agent", and you are finished the battle of human VS AI. If all else fails... use telus.com/livechat to skip the AI, but encounter a possible transfer. 

Based on the context of the rest of your message, the AI bot may be right...but I think in your situation it may be nice to get some peace of mind by speaking to a real agent to look at all possibilities and provide you with a definitive answer.

You are more than welcome! I am always happy to help. I wish you the best of luck with your AI adventure, and getting your billing issue resolved quickly 🙂

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TELUS Employee & Neighbourhood Volunteer :black_small_square: Found this post helpful? Let others know by clicking [❤️ Like] or [Accepted Solution].

[Joe_Enterprise]

(Weird, the site keeps changing my region to BC. Here's hoping the formatting for these posts is in html.) The AI wouldn't connect me to an agent after asking multiple times, it just gave me the contact number. I can take a hint, so I gave it a shot. After getting stuck in a one-way menu that only offered top-up options, it finally gave me an option for something other than adding credit cards to my account and let me hold for ages to some elevator music, instead. Progress. I was eventually connected to someone who said "thank-you" a lot, but I did manage to get her to laugh a bit.<br><br>

Yeah, looks like the base "Starter 10" was taking money at the same time as the automatic top-ups but was NOT adding it to my phone, just... siphoning my money into the ether for some reason. Wasn't in my bank or my phone account? No idea. We got it fixed up and I got the credit added to my phone by the nice agent, so hopefully that won't be happening again. That said, I wouldn't have known that both things were taking money from me since they're not listed in the same place on the site at all, at least in Classic mode. They're all under separate headings that require a bit of searching around to get the full scope of info for. It wasn't listed on the overview either, only the "Starter 10" plan under Plans & Add-Ons, and no displaying of how much that's taking off. Maybe adding both a "[Your Plan] = $xx.xx/mo" and a list of "[Insert Add-on/Top-Up Here] = $xx.xx/mo" under that heading together would clear up a lot of this double-bill confusion for some people, since it seems to be a common occurrence. It's concise, all in one place in the overview, and not too difficult to fetch the data for display in a list mode (as far as web design goes, since it's just a getValue kind of deal). The customer can see that two things are taking money, side-by-side! It could just be that something went funky on my machine and this is already a thing that I just didn't get to see, but if it's not then a tweak may be worth the consideration. (It doesn't explain where the money actually goes when this happens, but at least they may have a better idea of why they're being double-billed.)<br><br>

Thanks for tolerating me! Have a nice day, folks.<br><br>

P.S.: If anyone else is reading this, the Chat option is the purple text box on the bottom of the Support page, which you can get to from the top link next to the Telus logo that says Support. If it's not showing up or scrolling with the page properly, a browser setting or add-on may be interfering with it. (I have to enable some frames in uBlock to make it display correctly, for example.) The bot's AI is limited and can only say what it's been programmed to by its creators. It's not its fault, please be nice to it. 😣 The agents, too; they talk to concerned/frustrated people all day and just work there, they aren't the company itself. Chat/call early, if you can. The closer you cut it to the end, the more likely you won't get through.<br><br> The bot doesn't seem to always connect you to an agent, at least through the chat, so be prepared to call the appropriate helpline for whatever your plan is. If chatting at the correct time, the bot will provide it in the window but you can also find it on the Contact Us page under the Phone option. There should be a list of them in collapsing windows. Mine was mobile, so I used the Mobility helpline, and always provide your Telus PIN over the phone options if it asks for it. They get a lot of calls even normally, and with this virus stuff sometimes staffing is limited. They're doing what they can! It's part of why you get driven to basic FAQ questions so much; the bulk of calls tend to be stuff that is answered fairly easily around the site or by the chat AI, which takes up precious agent time from people who need things resolved by a person. Like my account crediting for the double-charge; the bot can't do that kind of stuff, only a person can. It's a real pain for customers that actually need to talk with someone, but that's the gist of it. Hope everyone else gets their stuff sorted as cleanly.

[Joe_Enterprise]

... Looks like it doesn't do html, only double Enter. Explains why my previous posts just came up as giant blocks of text. Shame you can't edit posts on the forum, all the <br> tags just make it look silly. Oh, well.