Martin : 3 Mobile price scam : Can you stop it?

geoff_s---r

Any chance of Martin embarrassing 3 mobile, and using his publicity muscle to stop an underhand 3 Mobile charging scam..

3 Mobile charge £7.50 pm to get 1GB of mobile broadband (USB dongle, through Quidco). As highlighted in Martin's newsletter

The evil bit is a phrase in 3 mobile's small print 'Out of Bundle charge (Per MB) £0.10'

I believe most people (including me) would not know what this means & little idea how many MB's are in a GB. (1,024?)

It means the 1st GB costs £7.50 but the 2nd GB costs you eye-watering £102.

Could I ask you, as a consumer's champion, to try persuading 3 mobile to change the line into understandable English : ie Usage over 1GB costs £102 per GB (charge at 10p per MB used).

You might perhaps add that if they don't change the line. Whenever you promote future 3 Mobile deals you'll highlight this over-charge directly under every headline price with a note questioning 3 Mobile's ethics? (almost criminal overcharging camouflaged behind tech-talk & small print)

I nominate 3 mobile for the 'Oik In With A Juicy Worm Awards', 2008

nomoneytoday

It does state it clearly when you sign up. However, I agree that £102.40 per GB is a ridiculous price

redux

3 have two other options with more capacity, equally clearly shown on the website, and you're quite free to choose which one you want, so it's hardly a criminal extortion racket as you suggest.

The prefixes M and G are in common use, and 3 use them exactly the same as anyone else, so they aren't trying to mislead.

If your use is mainly internet webpages, you'd need a lot of browsing to cause yourself a problem. If you listen to internet radio or watch a bit of video then those would add up a lot more quickly.

If you're worried, you can install a small programme to monitor your data use (one is called NetMeter), and if you think you'll be marginal, then 3 would probably be quite happy to upgrade you to the 3 GB or 7 GB package

hgt

I also signed up to the £5 per month / 1Gb deal thinking that 1Gb would be plenty as I don't use the net much. Though of course once you have a fast connection you use it more! I soon realised I should really have splashed out for the £7.50 per month / 5Gb deal instead! I called up Three who said that I couldn't have 5Gb for £7.50 per month as that was a special promotion, though at any time I could upgrade to 3Gb for £7.50 which I think is quite a fair price. So I'd suggest doing that if you are worried about going over the 1Gb limit.