I get WHY you are annoyed. Most of us been there at some point with the normal offshore CS.
The VM people on here usually try to help, it just takes a couple of days for them to respond through all the posts.
Leaving the equipment on the lawn may backfire. The law is very quirky in regards to "reasonable time" for them to collect and you could be giving an excuse for a small claims court/legal process outside of this for Virgin trying to recover the cost of the equipment if stolen or damaged by rain for example. The account holder entered into a hire agreement basically where it stipulates conditions in the contract about return of equipment.
In law, as stupid as it sounds, you have to leave the DD functional or pay some other way, as the bills, until proven inaccurate, will accumulate and the account holder's credit record will be affected and that is one lot of grief to then sort out. Once proven you would be refunded + any compensation. I hope the account holder factored in the 30 days notice period for cancellation of a service or services. as these would still appear on a future bill and then partial time amounts refunded at a later stage on another bill.
A small claims court will look at both sides of the story. If they deem you were being unreasonable, or performing action based on incorrect belief about billing, you'll lose. The company could counter claim that packaging for return was lost in the post, there have been postal strikes etc.
In short, you have to be very careful and sure as these companies are usually (but not always) operating within law, backed up by contractual terms. You don't want to add to the account holder's misery through emotional actions...
