Orange mobile broadband overcharging

coveredinbees

Hi,
This is the first time i've used a forum, so bear with me.
Just wondering if anyone else has had this problem.
I have a mobile broadband dongle with orange, have had it since Jun 2008. In April 2009 i recieved a bill for £219.99 worth of mobile broadband charges.
I bought the dongle cos I couldnt afford home broadband, and never went over my 3GB monthly allowance then when I was using it for everything. Since Dec 08 we have had home broadband so I barely use it anymore.
According to the tech department at Orange for a 3 week period it was connecting every 3/4 minutes and downloading exactly the same MB's everytime. And they said they could tell the genuine instances when I was using it. Its quite clearly some kind of glitch. How would I have done that for hours at a time, connecting and disconnecting and then downloading exact ly the same MBs everytime?
Anyway, Orange are demanding I pay for it, and have now cut off my mobile phone! I dont know what to do, I am unemployed at the moment and really can't afford this kind of problem.
Anyone else suffering the same thing??? or have any advice of what to do?
At the end of my tether
xx coveredinbees xx

Orange_Company_Representative

Hi there, I work for Orange and might be able to help.

Please send an email to [EMAIL="customer.services@orange.co.uk"]customer.services@orange.co.uk[/EMAIL], including your personal contact details and username from this site, and I will give you a call to discuss.

In order that your email is forwarded to me quickly, please add "Jonathan Orange Response" in the subject field and also in the first line of your mail.

Kind regards,

Jonathan
Orange Response Team

ihateorange

Hey,

Yes i'm pretty sure i have the same problem. My bill this month is for £256.44, my bill is generally around £15-£30 for my 3GB usage and i have had my contract for abour 6 months and have done nothing different in this last month, i only use it for checking e-mails, facebook and a bit of uni research. I also got my dongle to save money on the connection charges of getting a phoneline etc.

Orange also seem to like to make it hard to get in contact with them! I spoke to a "customer services" advisor on the phone that told me they could offer no explanation of what or how or when this had occured...then i read your post, realised there must be a way to find out and finally spoke to someone more helpful. They still told me however that i have to send an email to get a more detailed account of my usage, and they could not tell me a particular email address to direct my query to, just that i'd find it on their website...why is this information not available in my online account anyway?!? So i set about looking for who to email...most of the searches want to point you to a particular question and i cant find anywhere to make a particular complaint for my answer, when i found an email adress they said that they could not answer 'specific account questions' to ' keep my account safe' so i've e-maild them anyway and i'm hoping for the best.

This might not be the best thing to do but its what ive done...Currently i've simply cancellled my direct debit as i refuse to pay this money that i have not used. If this complaint doesn't work out then im going to go to an ombudsman...theres a company called phonepayplus n there number is 0800500212, i'm not even sure if theyl be much help but i found their website through reading the external orange terms and conditions somewhere. I hate having to bother with this stuff as its suuuuch a waste of time but im refusing to give up. You should refuse to pay them and keep persuing your case, simply take out a new contract if you NEED your mobile just now...again...this may not be the best idea and it may also affect your credit rating if u dont pay but...these companies that think they can exploit people have to be stopped, the internet is a great help to us 'average joes', communication is key and soon companies will realise that fairness is the only way to keep their customers, the more people that voice their compalints then the better, they need us to keep their business running and of they dont treat us fairly then soon people will know and will leave them for a better contract...

I'm soo angry, proabably ranted a bit too much and missed a few keys as im typing but i cant even be bothered spendig more time on this!!! I hope your complaint is resolved, if i have any luck i shall post again on here

mrJ_5

what about windows update? or anti-virus updates? and so on - though i wouldn't expect either to cost that much (although I guess a windows service pack could)

herbertthehelper

coveredinbees wrote: »

Hi,
This is the first time i've used a forum, so bear with me.
Just wondering if anyone else has had this problem.
I have a mobile broadband dongle with orange, have had it since Jun 2008. In April 2009 i recieved a bill for £219.99 worth of mobile broadband charges.
I bought the dongle cos I couldnt afford home broadband, and never went over my 3GB monthly allowance then when I was using it for everything. Since Dec 08 we have had home broadband so I barely use it anymore.
According to the tech department at Orange for a 3 week period it was connecting every 3/4 minutes and downloading exactly the same MB's everytime. And they said they could tell the genuine instances when I was using it. Its quite clearly some kind of glitch. How would I have done that for hours at a time, connecting and disconnecting and then downloading exact ly the same MBs everytime?
Anyway, Orange are demanding I pay for it, and have now cut off my mobile phone! I dont know what to do, I am unemployed at the moment and really can't afford this kind of problem.
Anyone else suffering the same thing??? or have any advice of what to do?
At the end of my tether
xx coveredinbees xx

Remember that loading a page will take some of your 3gb away - I dont know how much Orange will be prepared to do - probably not a lot. I would however as them to cap your account cause that seems to be the problem - or someone is using the connection.

ihateorange

Yeh MrJ i dont even accept large updates, i wait until i go into uni to use the wireless connection.
Heberthehelper, orange don't let you put a cap on your account. I've just spoken to various "customer service" advisors and have now bee told that i cannot receive an itemised bill for my account ( i dont even mean websites here, just the dates and bits used) as it is breaking the data protection act!? However the last woman i spoke to on the phone told me some of the charges on my bill...i'm getting so frustrated, surely this isn't breaking the data protection act by giving me a copy of my bill!? and surely it would already have been broken if another advisor could tell me some of my charges? The woman on the phone tried to fob me off by saying i could maybe get my bill from the data protection people? Why on earth would they have access to my orange mobilebroadband bill though!? I'm sure there just trying to distract meon another runaround. Can anyone help me what should i do? I'm reallly reluctant to pay this massive bill unless i can establish that i have actually used it on something i've maybe overlooked, i just want my bill so i can look at my diary and see what i was doing those days! I'm really starting to feel like something dodgy is going on though...why are they makig this so hard?