Huge Wireless Internet Bill For Abroad Use. Help!

n8sjs2bsiudb81267

Hi,

I have recently been to the us for a week, I used my usb interent stick for maybe 20 mins a day for 8 days. I have just got the bill and instead of the £15 pm normal charge they are trying to charge me £1000. I am not willing to pay this and if anyone has any advice who I can write to to help me fight this charge, the information would be very helpful.

thanks.

jdan9

You need to establish if the charges are correct or not. Get hold of an itemised bill if you can, showing each connection, the duration and the charge. If there is more usage than you believe there should be, this could be either erroneous or fraudulent - call your provider and explain to them that you didn't use it that much and they may give you the benefit of the doubt.

If the charges are indeed correct, you'd need to establish if you were made aware of these charges when you took out the contract. If you do have some paperwork that states these charges, you may find it difficult to challenge the charge (but bear in mind if the usage you state is correct then they have charged you around £6 a minute, which seems very excessive and most likely erroneous). If you weren't made aware of the charges you may have a better chance of refuting the bill.

macman

Roaming charges on mobile broadband are huge, so depending on whether you were just checking your email or downloading large files, the charges may or may not be correct, so as jdan9 says you need to get a breakdown of the usage. But if it is correct, I don't think you have any get out.
Look up what your network charges per MB for US access (could well be £3 per MB or more, so you'd only have to have used 300MB), and this should give you an approx idea of how many megs you are being charged for. Then check this against the usage meter on your software.

Pssst

You would have been better off finding and using free wi fi facilities (authorised or not !) .I suspect that the charges will not be far off the mark.

spiro

You dont say which network your mobile broadband connection is with. On Vodafone it will cost you about £4-5 per Mb, Orange is over £6/Mb. £1000/£5 = 200Mb over 8 days = 25Mb/day which is not a lot given that most mobile tariffs come with 1 to 5Gb (1000Mb to 5000Mb per month).

Obukit

Also, if you had Windows Update or other programs that auto-update, they could easily have downloaded hundreds of megabytes in your twenty minutes a day, without you even realising. If you're paying per MB for internet, make sure all of these are disabled or blocked.

SemperFi

spiro wrote: »

You dont say which network your mobile broadband connection is with. On Vodafone it will cost you about £4-5 per Mb, Orange is over £6/Mb. £1000/£5 = 200Mb over 8 days = 125Mb/day which is not a lot given that most mobile tariffs come with 1 to 5Gb (1000Mb to 5000Mb per month).

£1000/£5 = 200Mb over 8 days = 25Mb/day

But I agree.

n8sjs2bsiudb81267

thanks for all your help, i believe these charges are worked out correctly though i used my usb stick for 20 mins a day on avarage and i find these charges unfair and excessive, i am not willing to pay them and i am gonna fight this, any advice on avenues that can help me do this.

btw the network is orange.

Quentin

Rather than fight what you agree are correct charges, (which will just antagonise them, as you have no grounds for fighting), you may be better to ask for their help in letting you pay them in instalments.

Poppy9

If you took out your contract via an orange shop might be worth going in and explaining you didn't realise you would run up such a high bill etc. can't afford, in a panic, might need to cancel your contract etc. and they might see fit to reducing it.

n8sjs2bsiudb81267

i am not fighting a correct charge, i am fighting this because this charge is so expensive that I feel i am paying a huge fee for something that simple isn't worth it. This charge is £950 over the top and to agree to pay this in installments is insane. these company's shouldn't be allowed to get away with it and I think there must be something protect us as consumers against these insane fees.

does anyone know of a governing body who could help me tackle these fees?