Vodafone Passport Problem

NickAJ

My daughter has a £10.00 pay monthly contract (100 mins 500 texts) with Vodafone and before her school trip to France she signed up for Vodafone passport.

After getting a text from her to say she is being charged for her texts, I checked her account and it seems that Vodafone have a problem with their billing as she is being charged for some texts at 10p each.

Queried this with customer services and was told that passport only applies on the French Vodafone network! But they couldn't tell me anywhere that said this! Eventually I spoke to a manager who said that these charges would be refunded.

That's OK if you notice, and are on a pay monthly contract - what happens about PAYG?

Has anybody else noticed this?

Also Vodafone advertise this in all countries in Europe even where they don't have their own network - could be interesting!

davey4444

According to their website you must be on the SFR network in France to qualify for Passport rates.

http://www.abroad.vodafone.co.uk/index.cfm?do=cost.passport&me=a1&nu=1&le=1&sn=s7&tandc=true

Kingsd316

I was about to top up a PAYG sim from my trip to greece, according to their T&C i have to be on the Vodafone network over there to qualify, meaning i have to manually select it each time?

NickAJ

Hmm,

Those T & C's are buried on the pay monthly section.

The T&C link from the Passport page:

which I can't post, because I'm a new user

says:

2. The Promotion: TheOffer Period is from 0.00 on 1 June to 23.59 to 31 August 2009 UK time. Whilst registered with Vodafone Passport and within a Vodafone Passport country:
a) voice calls, texts and picture messages made or sent to the UK and within the same originating Vodafone Passport country during the Offer Period will be charged your standard UK rate; and
b) incoming calls (for first 60 minutes), texts and picture messages you receive during the Offer Period are free. From 60th minute an incoming call will cost 20p per minute and is charged per second.
Data usage is excluded.



..................


4. Vodafone Passport applies to voice calls made back to the United Kingdom or within the visited country and excludes calls to other countries, premium rate numbers and all data transfers (including text and picture messages). On Pay as you go, daytime, evening and weekend rates are charged according to the time in the country you are visiting. If you are in a country where there is more than one time zone, you will be charged according to the time in the capital city. All Pay as you go optional extras e.g. Vodafone Free Weekends, Vodafone Stop the Clock, Vodafone Family or Vodafone Text Unlimited do not apply to calls or texts made whilst abroad.
..........................


6. If your home price plan includes cheaper or free calls to mobiles or landlines within your business, these calls will be charged the connection fee plus usage of the inclusive minutes (if applicable). If you do not have inclusive minutes remaining these calls will be charged at the published Vodafone to Vodafone call rate for your price plan.

Nothing about a specific network there!

Jon_01

Kingsd316 wrote: »

I was about to top up a PAYG sim from my trip to greece, according to their T&C i have to be on the Vodafone network over there to qualify, meaning i have to manually select it each time?

Not each time, once you've told the phone to use a network it'll stay on that one all the time. So just select Voda when you get there and you'll be fine.

Vodafone

Hi NickAJ

This doesn't definitely doesn't sound right.

When we started the Summer Roaming Promotion we changed our policy so that you don't have to be on the prefered networks to take advantage of the lower rates.

I believe there was an issue early in the month where PAYG cusotmers were charged for some texts when travelling.

I'd like to look into this for you as I don't want you to be charged unnecessarily. This will require access to your account. Send your details over to me using the Contact Us form on our website. As well as your details, please include the subject "FAO Web Relations", a link to this thread and FIT135 in the body of the text.

Thanks

:cool:

Kirsty
Web Relations Team
Vodafone UK

readalot_2

Vodafone_company_representative wrote: »

Hi NickAJ

This doesn't definitely doesn't sound right.

When we started the Summer Roaming Promotion we changed our policy so that you don't have to be on the prefered networks to take advantage of the lower rates.

I believe there was an issue early in the month where PAYG cusotmers were charged for some texts when travelling.

I'd like to look into this for you as I don't want you to be charged unnecessarily. This will require access to your account. Send your details over to me using the Contact Us form on our website. As well as your details, please include the subject "FAO Web Relations", a link to this thread and FIT135 in the body of the text.

Thanks

:cool:

Kirsty
Web Relations Team
Vodafone UK

My daughter is in France and has received a text saying she will be charged, despite the fact that she registered for Passport. Her boyfriend who is with her has the usual 'you are now on passport...' text. Contacted Vodafone, and after several calls have been told that she is registered for passport and she won't be charged. Difficult to believe when she has a text telling her the opposite. Can't check to see if she is being charged because as usual the unbilled calls pages don't work!

NickAJ

I have emailed Vodafone so it will be interesting to get their reply.

Like readalot, unbilled minutes are not working so we can't check any usage etc.

I'll post more when we hear back.

Santiago_3

I am on Vodafone monthly plan with Passport, I called Vodafone last week, before travelling to France, to clarify the terms of the offer. I was told it would be the same as using the phone in the UK, i.e. all calls to and from the UK would be from my monthly plan, plus local calls in France would be included in the plan minutes too with no extra charges. Data and MMS excluded.
When I arrive in France the phone switched to SFR and I got this text

Welcome to FRANCE. Calls cost 38ppm to make & max 19ppm to receive. SMS 9.7p & max picture msg 161p. Daily cost for data is up to £4.99inc vat per 25MB allowance. We'll text you before we charge you again. Call 4636 for free pricing info & 112 for emergency services

I called vodafone who where extremely vague and said SFR was their partner in France and I should not be charged extra but if I was they would refund the charges, Hardly fills you with confidence does it? I am going to call Vodafone Business today to "discuss" this

Vodafone

Hi readalot and Santiago,

I'm confident we can clear up the confusion here.

Could you email following the instructions Kirsty posted on 12th?

As soon as we received your emails we'll get back to you as quickly as we can,

Thanks,

Lee

Web Relations Team

Vodafone UK

NickAJ

I had a phone call yesterday from a very helpful person from web relations.

Looking at the account it would appear that the "roaming" texts are not being taken from the inclusive bundle but are being charged as normal texts. We aren't being charged the non-passport rate, just the normal out of bundle rate (10p each).

It would appear that Vodafone are not sure whether this is a one-off on my daughters account, or an across the board problem. He did say that the account has been placed on a monitoring status so they will check what happens when the bill is generated and if necessary make a manual credit.

We still cannot get access to the unbilled minutes section and it could be that the automated text back system for reporting how many texts and minutes you have is out of line with actual usage. The figure I got from Vodafone yesterday is different to the one my daughter received by text.

We'll see what happens when the bill is raised. The system will be tested before then as the phone will be used in Greece shortly!

I must add that the person who phoned from Vodafone was very polite and helpful and seemed genuinly interested in resolving the problem.