has o2 been hacked ?

[Anonymous]

After 16 months of o2 happily taking payment for my wife’s monthly bill by direct debit, they have suddenly contacted her to ask her to settle the latest bill. She has had a couple of on-line chats with o2 to try and find out what has gone wrong. It seems they have lost her direct debit instruction details. They blame the bank, but we can see our on-line bank details show the direct debit is still firmly in place, so the problem is definitely not there, it is with o2. How can they lose my wife’s direct debit details, highly sensitive information which includes her name, bank sort code and account number ? Have they been hacked ? Does someone else now have her details ? She has demanded an explanation, but so far has heard nothing. I fear the worst ! Has anyone else had this problem ?

[jonsie]

Not something I have had a problem with. For some reason there is a problem with the details they have/haven't. There is no reason to think they have been hacked. Needless to say, keep an eye on your account and change passwords but hopefully O2 have reinstated the DD.

[Bambino]

@Anonymous Don't rely on Live Chat to discuss your account. Call customer service on 202 from your mobile and speak to someone about this.

[Cleoriff]

There has been a so called revamp of the payment systems but this is the first I have heard of direct debits creating a problem. As said, don't use live chat... ring on the number given and speak to an advisor You can also keep an eye on your bills by checking in My O2 http://www.o2.co.uk/myo2

[MI5]

No such problems for me.

[jonsie]

There would have been if you had spoken to live chat...:smileywink:

[Martin-O2]

Hi @Anonymous welcome to the forum! 

This sounds like it should be a simple fix of resetting the direct debit with O2 but you may need to cancel the existing one with your bank first. I advise contacting customer services again to reset the DD but as suggested by some others its worth changing your passwords just to be on the safe side. 

[MI5 · Accepted solution]

Firstly, I can't see why anyone would hack into your O2 account and delete the DD details. If they wanted the bank details they would surely just copy them, rather than delete them (which draws attention to the fact).
Secondly, I'm not aware that you can cancel a DD online anyway (with O2). If you wanted to do that it would have to be done with the bank.
This is more likely a system / account update that has failed to retain all the previous info for some reason.
When you've been around as long as most of us, you no longer get surprised by "glitches" with O2's systems.