I hope you at least have some proof that they did what they said they would?
Surprised some find this complex and dont understand that I have called, emailed, visited (and had a French friend visit) plus have had a French person submit registered letters of cancellation on my behalf.
After many years as an auditor in many (sometimes dodgy) countries, I put the issue down to 2 frequently recurring factors: Greed and Arrogance ( and no I do not support the generalisation that all the French are arrogant)
The bank (Credit Agricole Trebes) convinced me to move to their insurance company so they could make more money. They screwed up in the cancellation with AXA Nice but were too arrogant or lazy to check and AXA Nice were greedy and dishonest, ignored the cancellation instructions from the bank and continued to deduct payments. Credit Agricole were then too arrogant to fix this plus saw a potential loss of their own insurance income so ignored any requests to fix it. They have now, with no effective notification or explanation, closed my account because its cheaper for them and easier than fixing their mistake.
Bouygues have greedily taken advantage of my inexperience with French direct debit rules massively prejudiced to the receiver to screw me for 4 years whilst providing no phone service on a SIM they were advised had been replaced years ago
I have contacted the ombudsman but dont have high hopes.
I also opened an account with HSBC Australia which promised AUD and Euro accounts but turns out no IBAN on the euro account so I don’t think phone company etc would accept for Direct debits??
Phone company maybe, but the others, elec, water etc., as I pointed out may well accept international transfers. Direct debits are not necessary with everything as I have proved, only using the 2 which would accept no other method.
Problem is that i think from memory, your method required your presence in France to receive a paper copy if the bill. Am I remembering correctly ?
So whose fault is it that HSBC Australia don’t provide an IBAN with their Euro account? Surely it was in the terms and conditions when you opened the account. It seems to me that a misunderstanding of terms and conditions is the root of the problem throughout this thread.
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Yes you are, but I also said that as your payments are reasonably easy to predict you could send them without a paper bill, as I did, and do, with my foreign credit card account.
I wasnt blaming HSBC. It was purely an update because I had previously mentioned HSBC as a possible solution but it was not clear until the account was opened yesterday that an IBAN wasnt available. Given IBANs are not always available to everyone in this group, i had hoped for some advice from those helpful people here But its good you have proved its not only banks that are arrogant
is that a snide comment directed at @JohnBoy
If so, you might want to look more inwards at the underlying causes for your issues.
Stop blaming the messenger!
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