Three Ireland has started a six-month process to refund former customers almost €2.7 million in post-cancellation charges and other credits that remained on inactive accounts.
The mobile company said it had last year "proactively" begun a process to review customer accounts to determine if customers were entitled to a refund due to post-cancellation charges. This followed a review of other mobile operators by watchdog ComReg.
Three has since confirmed that it will refund customers €1.28 million in post-cancellation charges and €1.4 million for other credits that were left on inactive accounts.
The company said these charges and credits would previously been available to customers on request.
It has this week begun to return the funds to its former customers, crediting their bank accounts directly. Some 173,000 customers are in line for the refunds, with 88 per cent receiving a sum of €30 or less. The company declined to give a figure for the highest refund it will offer.
“Three Ireland will contact customers in the coming weeks. Three Ireland will be emailing all impacted customers outlining what has happened, the amount to be refunded and when they can expect to receive the funds in their accounts. All customers will have their money refunded by September 2022,” the company said in a statement.
It added that it had “put in place processes to mitigate the possibility of this happening in the future”.
Watchdog comments
Three Ireland informed ComReg of the extent of the refunds due in January, the regulator said.
“ComReg expects all undertakings to ensure that they comply with the provisions of section 45 of the Communications Regulation Act 2002 [as amended], including not charging consumers post-cancellation charges or retaining other credits on inactive accounts,” it said.
“ComReg is continuing its programme of monitoring compliance by all undertakings and will take all necessary enforcement action in respect of any such activity.”
