Darren Clancy

Brought my car in for my annual NCT test and it failed on a number of items (fair enough, I expected that a few things would need to be done with it). I brought it to a mechanic and got everything fixed, booked it in for a retest and brought it back. The second time, they failed it again because one of my break lights was slightly less intense than the other (seemed like a stupid reason but fair enough, they know what they're doing). The guy told me I would need a visual retest and that I had a month to get the problem fixed and bring it back. I got the problem fixed and brought it back. When I got there, the guy refused to pass it as he said it was out of date and I would need a full retest. If anyone from the NCT is reading, here's a hint... Don't tell people they have a month to get their car retested if, when they bring it back 2 weeks later, you're going to say it's out of date.

My direct debit didn't go through on 6th January when it should have (due to an error with my bank). Once again, it didn't go through on 6th February due to the same error. Eir chose not to inform me that the direct debit wasn't going through until 22nd March, at which point they had applied very significant late payment fees that they are now refusing to take remove. Based on the reviews here, I've gotten off lightly with them. Steer well clear of this company and, if you have a contract with them, get out of it asap and switch to one of their competitors. Eir are only looking for an opportunity to take your money. Some of their well known competitors worth looking into would be Virgin, Vodafone or Sky.

If I could give zero stars I would.

I've been with Panda for a little over a year. In that time, they've failed to collect my bins on four separate occasions. Three of these were around the busy Christmas period, when the bins were full to the brim. On two of those occasions, they charged my account without informing me that this was going to happen (resulting in my account not having enough money to cover collection). One of these was a government levy. To date, they still haven't told me what the other is for. Why they felt the need to place these charges on the account the day before collection (twice) and not inform me is a mystery. The other time they failed to collect the bin was because they had forgotten to send me the 'Panda' labels for the bin, so the drivers wouldn't take them. This seems strange considering the drivers had been taking them for some time before this.

I want to point out that, all four of the times Panda failed to collect my bins, I called their contact number only to be told that there was nothing they could do... I would just have to wait two weeks until the next collection. To add insult to injury, they informed me that their drivers would take "one extra bag" along with my wheelie bin when they returned in two weeks (is that supposed to help?). Meanwhile, my bins were overflowing.

Dear Panda, when it's your mistake that someone's bins are not collected, it's your responsibility to rectify the problem. Honestly, it's not my problem if your drivers won't be back in the area for another two weeks. Own your mistakes!

I've decided to switch to Oxigen who, from what I can see, are far better value.