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Mobile Phone Ash Cloud Disruptions

lky2k23
lky2k23 Posts: 302 Forumite
Part of the Furniture 100 Posts Combo Breaker
Me and about 30 friends have been stuck in America for the past week, having to call home and agents (expedia) for the past week at £1.30 a minute.

Are mobile phone companies just sitting there counting their cash at the moment or will any thing be done to help their customers? Some of us were on hold to Expedia for upto 4 hours!
Just have a little faith

Comments

  • robt_2
    robt_2 Posts: 3,401 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture Combo Breaker
    Why should your phone company help you? It is for your airline/insurance to sort out surely?
  • djheath
    djheath Posts: 453 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 100 Posts Combo Breaker
    You could have bought a phone card which would have given you very cheap calls abroad. They sell them in all the supermarkets and newsagent type places over there.
  • eranou
    eranou Posts: 377 Forumite
    I remember when I worked for T-Mobile at the time of the tsunami they gave free calls to people in affected countries and free calls to them however I dont think the ash cloud is as serious as that for them to do it in this situation
  • lky2k23
    lky2k23 Posts: 302 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 100 Posts Combo Breaker
    robt - they are just making money off a bad situation. Its no ones fault but a bit of help here and there would help. We have seen the fuss about bank charges on this site and that was a situation that could have been avoided.
    djheath - maybe but at 7am saturday when people realised they were not flying home that day as planned and had to contact companies to get sorted, going to a shop to get a sim card wasnt really an option, would it have been much cheaper anyway, still be calling UK. And obviously we didnt all realise we would be on hold between 2-4 hours.
    Just have a little faith
  • You can try putting in a goodwill request when you get back direct with T-Mob, or see if your insurance company will pick up the tab. Using a mobile abroad for outbound calls is insanely expensive though - it's cheaper to feed a phone box with quarters to make such calls, if all else fails.
    Starting Debt: ~£20,000 01/01/2009. DFD: 20/11/2009 :j
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  • lky2k23
    lky2k23 Posts: 302 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 100 Posts Combo Breaker
    4 hour call be a lot of quarters.
    Just have a little faith
  • redux
    redux Posts: 22,976 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 10,000 Posts Name Dropper
    edited 23 April 2010 pm30 12:43PM
    Actually, some phone companies have done something about this:

    we’ve made contact numbers for the biggest airlines free from any country outside the UK.

    http://blog.o2.co.uk/home/2010/04/if-youre-stuck-abroad-we-can-help.html


    edit:

    as well as that, if your phone is not network locked, get a local SIM card, and arrange some kind of callthrough access for cheap international calls

    or some have their own cheap int'l calls, such as Tuyo
This discussion has been closed.
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