'Why won't TalkTalk allow me to cancel my phone contract?' Since your initial cancellation request, you had not used the Sim card. More than four months after you began trying to end your contract and three days after I contacted TalkTalk for you, it was cancelled at last. The two payments of £8.45 and £9.50 have been refunded and the demand for an additional £24 has been cancelled; £30 to cover expenses has also been paid. A TalkTalk spokesman said: "We are sorry we did not cancel Mr Shaw's account as requested and have waived all fees." Pension company won't let partner be a beneficiary Next month, when I become 60, my pension payments from CIS are due to begin, although I doubt that this will be possible due to a problem with terminology usage within their documentation. I am not married but have lived with my partner for the past 28 years. The paperwork received from CIS shows two options for payment. The first, a monthly income for me with 50pc of the income I would have received going to my spouse/partner on my demise. The second option shows a tax-free lump sum and a monthly payment for me with 68.4pc going to my spouse/partner on my death. This is where the problem lies, as CIS are refusing to name my partner as a beneficiary as he is financially independent and, therefore, not a dependant. I wonder if you would be kind enough to assist. YB Devon Like you, I could find nothing in the literature stipulating that a partner needed to be financially dependent. Even so, the Co-operative Bank, of which CIS is a part, advised you that a dependent partner would be required to prove financial dependency at the point of the death in order to receive a dependant's pension under the plan. When I challenged it on this, it admitted to being wrong. It now said, contrary to what you and your adviser had been told on more than one occasion, there was no requirement to show that one person is entirely, mainly or equally dependent on the other. They only need to demonstrate that there has been some element of reliance on each other financially. For example, having joint responsibility for bills, a joint mortgage or joint property ownership or having mirror wills. You have lived with your partner for 28 years. Co-operative Bank believes it is highly likely that your partner would meet the mutual dependency criteria, although it said: "He will be asked to provide evidence of this in the event that she predeceases him." It then paid you £50 as an apology, it said, for incorrect information and acknowledged that "it is evident that we need to review our processes and documentation surrounding this issue." It tells me it is currently doing this. With your adviser you now chose one of the retirement options which included a dependant's pension. In the midst of arranging this you report you were informed that, at the time when you were written to initially, it was a requirement that partners were financially dependent on the policyholder. You say you can only conclude, therefore, that it has been my involvement which has brought about a recent change of policy. Given the jumble of information I have received from the bank on this issue, I am at a loss to tell for sure whether this is true or not. What is certain is that this case has clarified the point and should make things easier for any couples who find themselves in a similar predicament in the future. A little later you received a phone call from someone who seemed to know nothing of the arrangement whereby your partner did not need to be dependent in the way referred to and told you that you were going for the incorrect pension option. You explained all that had happened. Soon this person came back and said that the people she had spoken to had decided to stand by the higher-value retirement options that the bank had issued. The bank said that an incorrect calculation had been made with respect to the guaranteed minimum pension (GMP) element of your pension. It said two issues had been confused. There had also been a problem over receiving statements in the past. This, it said, dates back to when Co-operative's financial advisers stopped distributing statements and instead they were sent directly from the head office. At that stage, however, your details appear not to have been properly tied up so the material was not sent to you. A further letter has been sent to unscramble some of the misinformation you had been given even after my involvement. All this certainly flags up the need for more training for the bank's staff. The bank says that lessons have indeed been learnt from all this. Your pension is now up and running as you want and as a result of the muddles is, I am told, substantially enhanced. My contact believes the difference will run into thousands of pounds overall, although she is not being precise. Also you have the undertaking about your partner which was so elusive before my involvement.