Vodafone charging me for inclusive texts for 2 years!

Techhead_2

I think you've misunderstood what Vodafone are saying. Some handsets send long text messages as MMS, its a simple setting change on your phone to send them as multiple texts.

The reason handsets offer this option is because if you are paying individually for texts an MMS is cheaper than multiple texts. Of course if you have inclusive texts then you would be charged extra as per your terms and conditions.

mzg

Hello Techhead. I don't think I've misunderstood. Vodafone told me that I should know any text over 160 in length is classed as MMS and I pay. They told me to switch on the character count and stop and send when it gets to 160 characters. I have done this, but as I say, not what the terms and conditons say. I have iphone 4, and tried it out and once it gets to 160 it doesn't give any options or anything. Is there some other setting? I'm waiting for a call from a manager. Yesterday he/she was on a long call and couldn't talk (ha!) and the call would be so long they couldn't call me back that day, and the supervisor was on break. Still waiting. I won't hold my breath.

If you have any idea where this setting is on the iphone 4, I'd love to hear, but I can't find anything, and Vodafone certainly didn't say this was an option (just the word count facility)

Hintza

Fair point MZG. I would just wonder how something like this woud get through their T&Cs. I imagine they pay their legal experts a foune so they can't trip themselves up.

Fresh pair of eyes on ther T&Cs?

squeaky

Hi,

We have a mobile phones board and the members there should be able to help you with accessing character count on your phone and, for a bet, they'll know their way round the T&C's too, so I'll move your post across there.

Good luck

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Techhead_2

mzg wrote: »

Hello Techhead. I don't think I've misunderstood. Vodafone told me that I should know any text over 160 in length is classed as MMS and I pay. They told me to switch on the character count and stop and send when it gets to 160 characters. I have done this, but as I say, not what the terms and conditons say. I have iphone 4, and tried it out and once it gets to 160 it doesn't give any options or anything. Is there some other setting? I'm waiting for a call from a manager. Yesterday he/she was on a long call and couldn't talk (ha!) and the call would be so long they couldn't call me back that day, and the supervisor was on break. Still waiting. I won't hold my breath.

If you have any idea where this setting is on the iphone 4, I'd love to hear, but I can't find anything, and Vodafone certainly didn't say this was an option (just the word count facility)

I wish you had mentioned iPhone before, this is one of those things that Apple consider a feature but the rest of the world calls a bug. As far as I know unlike every other phone, there is no way of stopping the iPhone doing this other than sending shorter texts. (See the Apple advisory).

mzg

Hello Tech, thanks for the response. I know a few people with iphones and they've never been charged for longer texts, but they aren't with vodafone. It turns out, after lots of investigation, that the messages were sent to an email address which was linked with the contact phone number, but only the longer messages, not the shorter ones. So it would seem that either vodafone or the iphone sends longer messages via email. I have now removed the email address from the contact details. If anyone has had this problem before, I'd love to hear about it, but as I say, I know a number of people who haven't had this problem. (They are O2 and Virgin) I daren't try sending a longer text, but they weren't even particularly long and probably only 200 characters.

I'm not very good with message boards, could you send me the link to Apple Advisory? Is it on the Apple site or a forum? grrrr!

I don't understand all the different excuses Vodafone give me but one said if sent via email it would use data and I'd be charged for that. I'm at a loss, I only use home wifi, data roaming etc is off, so would I be charged for data? Still at a loss as to why the phone/vodafone decided to send it via email. I definitely clicked on the mobile phone number. This happened five times.

jayme1

no you would never be charged for data if you were using your own or free wifi.

also if you have included data with your tariff then you would not be charged for sending an email.
if you didnt have inclusive texts and were charged for data for the cost of a 10p SMS you could send almost a 20,000 word email (at 30p per MB).

as for the sending of an MMS instead of several SMSs then that is just what the iphone does, to stop it you just have to simply keep under the 160 length (there should be a counter while you are typing), yes I know it is annoying and yes I know every other mobile phone in the world will automatically split the long text into several SMS messages, but apple didnt want it to work that way.

the maximum SMS length is 160 characters any more even 161 would have to be send either in 2 SMSs or one MMS (MMS maximum length is 1000 letters)

the probable reason others havent been charged for MMS is because MMS count on their tariffs I know that on o2 if you dont have 'unlimited' SMS then it uses 4 of your inclusive SMSs to send an MMS.

mzg

Jayme, geez, the wonder of Apple huh?! I will warn my daughter as I have just treated her to the same iphone contract. As she has to pay anything over the £40, I am sure she will be manically counting the characters when she texts. If it is an Apple issue, then surely Vodafone should have said so outright. Yes I have data included, plus the hotspot thingy, but will in all probability very rarely use that, and as I say, have all data roaming switched off. I even have 3G off as I can't even get a phone signal in the house with that on, as soon as I switch if off, I get full signal.

I have all roaming facilities off, and use purely wifi at home, but they insist that they are data charges for sending the text via an email. As I say, I didn't choose that, either the phone or vodafone sent it that way as the address was in the contact details. But yes, charged I was for it being sent that way. Five times in fact.

I have to confess I don't find the iphone particularly amazing. One of the vodafone customer service guys even suggested I switch it to airline mode to avoid charges! Yes, I swear, airline mode is what he said. <<insert eye roll>>

jayme1

customer service quote of the year :rotfl: though I use airplane mode if you ever go abroad to prevent the accidental £3000+ data charges you hear about (since I won't use the phone for calls or texts while abroad and only use wifi)

this is how you turn on the character count on the iphone, no idea why it isn't on as standard, (the numbers will only show when you go over 80 characters) http://www.theiphoneguru.net/2010/06/24/iphone-ios-4-tip-character-count-for-sms/

from that page you can also turn off MMS messages, I wonder if that would cause the text to split into several SMSs? certainly turn it off if you never want to send MMSs though

mzg

Jayme, thanks again. I figured out how to get the count working, and no surprise, my daughter soon got that working too!

I can't switch off MMS as my other daughter sends me pictures regularly, and I wouldn't be able to receive them.

I travel overseas a lot, and Vodafone told me to simply switch off 3G, mobile data and mobile data network to avoid charges. I have my phone on (not used iphone yet though) as I receive texts and with my t-mobile I could send pictures messages from overseas out of my allowance.

But to have it in airline mode in the UK .... as you say, customer service quote of the year! In that case, I may as well stick with my ipod and bongo drums.

As you say, it would be interesting to know that if I switched off MMS, would the longer texts then go as several SMS. Not sure I want to pay to find out though!

Thank you all for your comments and advice.