By Prior Beharry
ONCE a TSTT landline is disconnected there is no more liability on the account expect the arrears.
This was the statement by Chief Executive Officer of TSTT Lisa Agard on Thursday after she was contacted by AZPNews.com about a case of a pensioner who complained that he was still paying a rental although his service was disconnected.
“Once you are disconnected no bills are generated so there is no liability on your account,” she said.
Agard made the comment in response to a video blog by activist and head of Citizens Union of Trinidad and Tobago Phillip Edward Alexander.
Alexander said he was at the TSTT outlet at Westmoorings on Thursday when he overheard a pensioner complaining that he was in arrears and he was unable to disconnect his account and thus was accruing $126 in rental per month.
He said, “He is literally trapped in a situation where he has a phone in his house that he cannot use because it is cut but it is generating a bill of $126 a month and it is sinking him deeper in a hole.” He said there could be many people in this situation.
Alexander said the customer service representative said there was not much she can do.
He called on TSTT to give people the option whose phone have been “cut” to disconnect their service and pay off their arrears.
Contacted for comment, Agard said she was aware of the situation and did not want to speak too much about it because of customer confidentially.
She noted that this was not a case of the man being out of service for months.
Agard said the man was only disconnected recently in “the last couple of days” for non-payment.
She said, “This is absolutely no question of him not having a service and him getting a bill in connection with services he did not have. That is certainly not how we work.”
The newly-appointed CEO said, “Once you are disconnected no bills are generated. So there is no liability on your account.”
Agard said the man’s son paid the bill and his service has been reconnected.
She said, “If a customer is in arrears he has to pay.”
Agard said, “If your account is disconnected the system does not general a bill. If the system does not general a bill there is no liability on your account.”
Asked if the customer will still have to pay a monthly rental if disconnected?
She said, “If you are disconnected no bill is generated. You don’t get no bill because you are disconnected. You not getting the service so not getting a bill.”
But Agard noted that TSTT will still want the money owed to them.
She added, “Just because you have no further liability from the date of the disconnection doesn’t erase the owed debt then the company makes a decision what it wants to do in terms of how it pursues you to try and recover the debt. That is all. And the company has plenty options in this regard.”
See Phillip Edward Alexander video blog below:
