Debt error leaves pensioner angry

Rose Brookman, 66, from Kingsdown Park in Swindon, was also threatened with being taken to court.

Now NTL has apologised and admitted it was wrong, but Mrs Brookman, a mother of four and grandmother of eight, is still angry.

Her case came to light barely a fortnight after the Evening Advertiser highlighted the suffering of widowed Eleanor Gray, 68, who was bombarded with demands in the name of her late husband, John.

This was despite Mrs Gray, from Wootton Bassett, repeatedly telling the cable television firm it was mistaken. NTL finally apologised.

Mrs Brookman said: "NTL is terrible.

"I never had a problem with the old Comtel firm before NTL took over, or with the firm that came before Comtel.

"But since NTL took over, it has been terrible.

"The frustration is the worst thing, because you keep ringing their customer care numbers but you don't get any satisfaction at the other end of it."

Mrs Rose's problems began in February. Tired of interruptions to NTL's television service, she gave the firm a month's notice of the cancellation of her standing order.

Later receiving two bills totalling nearly £26, she paid them, assuming she owed the money.

NTL, she says, then began bombarding her with new standing order forms and bills, despite repeated telephone calls and letters.

The firm failed to collect its equipment and some weeks ago Mrs Brookman finally took it to the firm's Hawksworth headquarters and left it with a manager.

In recent weeks she has received a letter from a debt collection agency, referring to the potential affect on her credit rating and threatening to send doorstep collectors, and one from a solicitor threatening court action.

In a final irony, NTL sent a technician to her home on Monday to collect the equipment she had taken to its headquarters weeks before.

NTL spokeswoman Odette Sullivan said the firm apologised for its errors.

She added that the records had been wiped clean and Mrs Brookman would not be pursued any longer.