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Everything you always wanted to know about France - from France |
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Hi Tony, Could you please give me a little advice? We had a visit from a company who service fire extinguishers in France the year before last, unfortunately I was out and my wife let the guy service 1 fire extinguisher. We got a bill and paid it in cash. After some chasing of the bill the supplier finally accepted we had paid & stopped chasing. The following year he took the fire extinguisher away if I'm not mistaken as we had told him we no longer wanted this and I had 3 of my own (all new). I did send a fax in 2004 cancelling the service and then a letter after we had further contact for the bill payment issue. My in laws have just come back from staying in our house and have given us a bill after this same company visited and serviced my own extinguishers at a cost of Euro 120 which was more than I paid for the things only 2 years ago. I am going to ask a local if they would call as my French is not up to anything more than Beer and Food. Do you think they can really claim this money or do you think I am within my rights to tell them to get lost? Rgds Steve === Hi Steve Many businesses in France make a living by using the "guilty until proved innocent" model of charging for services. Try canceling a bank debit or changing your insurance company. Even the simplest thing often needs a registered letter before they will accept that you wish to terminate of transfer an arrangement. I tend to go in person, with witnesses and then shout and scream (especially at bank mangers) until they actually do something and sign it in front of me. I am told that crying real tears while thumping the desk works even better. I actually had to close one bank account to stop a debit from a charge card of 10 euro a month for a service I cancelled a year earlier. Rule one - never pay for anything in cash Rule tow - never order anything which is an automatically repeated service. It sounds as if this fire extinguisher company is targeting ex-pat clients, possibly from the phone book, and service items they probably have no right to - once they have done the service you are then obliged to pay. You need to write letter clearly in French telling them to cease, send it recorded delivery an tell them you will report them to French fraud office - your local Mairie will tell you the address. So tell them to get lost, but the French way, in writing and making a lot of noise. Hope this helps Tony There are over 2,000 features and articles on this site about French life and living in France. You can search from the search box above. Do browse through our website and please use the advertising links, they help pay for the site. I do try to reply to all mail - Contact Me - most is about property or living in France. I publish comments in this newsletter which I believe are of interest and may help find answers for people wanting to come to France. I hope readers will go to the adverts which help support our overheads. |
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