Lenox

According to FACUA, the consumer association, the worst company from the five nominated for 2012 (Ryanair, Movistar, Vodafone, Bankia and the CAM) was Movistar.

cricketman

Interestingly 1 of these companies is British and the other Irish!

I think Telefonica/Movistar win year after year

I see Vodafone are making their staff work 4 day weeks or take unpaid holiday time off and are no longer giving free phones with contracts

amideislas

why am I not surprised?

steviedeluxe

Once companies get to a certain size they become international corporations anyway. I'm sure that if the Irish govt told Ryanair to close down their Irish offices (unlikely) that Ryanair could operate just as before from another base.

You can see why some people dislike Ryanair. Just seen this story - Ryanair adds six Euro surcharge to tickets purchased in Spain.

http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news...le_34140.shtml

Further edit - seems like some sneaky charges if you take out that passport mastercard they are promoting

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/h...y-charges.html

amideislas

Yep, Stevie -

In fact, Telefonica (Movistar) is the world's 3rd largest telecommunications company (it used to be #1), historically leveraging the common nepotism found in some of the world's largest socialist-driven countries (in Europe, Central, Latin & South America) enabling them to operate very profitably as a virtual monopoly in many of those countries (Spain previously being one of them, but they still receive favouritism from the government here, too), which might help explain why they are also the world's worst telecom.

EsuriJohn

Who on earth likes Endesa why are they not there on the list.

olivetree

We keep a UK mobile phone, O2 ( owned by Movistar) to send text messages back to the UK...cost 10p including tax. If we use our Movistar Spanish mobile it costs about 65cents plus tax to send a text message to the UK. No choice, use the O2 phone, especially when son tops it up for me as O2 won´t recognise my Spanish postcode on the topping up bit on the phone.

I agree, how did Endesa skip the list?

Re Ryanair, I have just booked a return trip to Bordeaux from Sevilla for 35.61€ (47.61€ after the card charge) so I can´t complain about Ryanair

johnnyone

I use Ryanairs Cash passport card and as long as you only use it to pay for flights it's fine.
I leave a small balance on the card, load it up via a debit card (free) just before buying the flights and then pay using the card.

Lenox

Perhaps the good people of Facua were trying to dump on Ryanair - whose policies are colourful rather than a massive threat to the average Spaniard's purse. I would also have added Endesa.

Domino

I would also add Endesa

We have momentary power cuts at least 3 times a week but there are huge National Grid pylons marching across the local landscape.

Can I bill them for the time taken in resetting clocks and computers ??

amideislas

Endesa? well, perhaps it's because this year they started answering the phone.

Profits are down to less than €5 billion, so maybe some rogue Einstein in PR is has come up with the wild notion that customer service might help them get a few billion back...

... but then again, overcharging the public has been the most profitable solution so far, so no need to change that.

Fredbargate

It's Vodafone for me every year

Lynn R

Vodafone is the only one on the list I've had any problem with, so they get my vote! (No problems with Endesa either).

I recently wanted to cancel my Vodafone Internet Contigo contract, after the 18 month minimum period was up. The information leaflet that they send out with their bills said customers have the right to cancel and can do so either my writing to the address given in the leaflet, sending a fax or ringing the Customer Service number. So I sent a letter (certificada) to the correct address, and checked on the Correos website that it had been delivered. After waiting a few days, I rang them to find out why the line was still active. They claimed the letter hadn't been received (although I had evidence to the contrary) and said that wasn't the proper way to do it anyway (in spite of my quoting what it said in their leaflet back at them) and I needed to send a fax, and ring them again after 48 hours to check it had been received.

I duly sent a fax the same day (cost a further 3€ on top of the postage I'd already paid) and rang them back 48 hours later. Surprise, surprise - they'd received the fax but the agent said they couldn't read it and I would have to send it again (I had printed in in block capitals in black ink to avoid just such a problem). At this point I lost it and started demanding that they record my complaint and give me a complaint number so that I could then take it up with the Telecommunications Ministry complaints service (which their information leaflet says they must do). They wouldn't do that, but the person I spoke to offered to change me onto a pre-paid system so that if I didn't use the dongle any more I would not have to pay anything further. I said OK, was asked to hold on and then he came back and told me I had to pay 6€ for the privilege!!! After more banging my head against a brick wall I agreed to go ahead and have since received an invoice which showed the change has been effected, so I am sincerely hoping that no more invoices are received, but with this shower anything is possible.

jackytoo

Telefónica has been fined a record 151 million euros by Brussels for abusing it's dominant position in Spain.

http://www.diariosur.es/rc/20120329/...203291045.html

amideislas

Hmm, Endesa only gets about €900K in fines annually (small price to pay for €20-€30 million in illicitly obtained profits). And it's imposed by Spain, not Brussels.

Womder what Bruissels thinks of Endesa.