psychonaut

Well, as suggested I sent the letter of complaint to the CEO.  The CEO kicked it back to customer service (or more specifically "Beschwerdemanagement") who sent me a letter, dated 28 November, which I received yesterday.  The letter, without explicitly admitting any negligence or wrongdoing on their part, expresses regret for the "Unannehmlichkeiten" and informs me that the fees have been cancelled "aus Kulanz".   Hopefully this will be the end of the matter, though I wouldn't be at all surprised if they were to send me yet another bullshit invoice next year…

  That's very kind of you.  I've gone ahead and drafted the complaint in German but will send you a PM in case you'd like to check it over for me.

I left Germany in March and so cancelled my contract with my TV/Internet provider from Hell, Unitymedia and received back written confirmation of same. I left my German bank account open so that the final three monthly SEPA payments would go through.  (Outrageously, the earliest you can terminate the contract is three months after you leave the country, even if you give notice several months in advance of your moving date—but this is the subject of another thread.)   Anyway, on the fourth month after leaving, Unitymedia erroneously sent me another monthly bill.  I rang them up and explained to them that we no longer had a contract.  They agreed, confirmed to me that the bill had been sent in error, and told me to ignore it as no money would be taken from my account.  I stupidly believed them, and of course several weeks later I noticed that they had charged my bank account for the bill.  Presumably their SEPA mandate expired with the termination of our contract, so I had my bank reverse the charges and then closed the account, since I no longer needed it.   Three months passed without any communication from Unitymedia.  Then I suddenly received yet another invoice claiming that I owe them yet another monthly payment, plus several months' "late fees".  So I called them again to point out the mistake.  They explained to me that immediately after I reversed the charges on the last erroneous payment, they also tried to correct their mistake by depositing the same amount into my account.  I checked my final bank statement (which had only just arrived, it being sent quarterly) and sure enough, the final three transactions in the account are their erroneous charge, my reversal of it, and then a deposit in the same amount from them.  Fine, I tell them, I will for the second time in a row correct their mistake by returning to them the monthly charge.  But I said that I am not going to pay any "late fees" because this was their billing error, not mine, and moreover because they had waited three months for the late charges to rack up before telling me about them.  They agreed, confirmed that the late fees had been added in error, and told me to ignore them as they would be voided.  I stupidly believed them, and of course several weeks later I received yet another invoice for the unpaid late fees, plus another late fee tacked on for good measure.   Any advice on what I should do now?  I suppose I could contact them in writing (not by phone) to explain things, though that will require some effort (writing a proper business letter in German takes a long time for me) and, judging from their track record, still won't guarantee that the problem will be solved.  What would be the consequences of simply ignoring the phony bill for the time being?  And if I do write to complain, I might as well write as well to the regulator to complain.  Is there some state institution that handles consumer complaints about TV/Internet/telecom providers that will give Unitymedia some grief on my behalf?