making texts in the USA

ronaldo3943

My wife and I are both with o2 at the Carphone Warehouse. We go to las Vegas twice a year for about 6 weeks in total so need to use our mobiles for making sms messages. When I renegotiated a sim only package for my wife, CPW arranged for her to have 1000 standard texts as part of her tariff and the rest unlimited. This is because o2 generally allow users to make texts abroad on the basis of 4 for 1 ie a standard tariff of 1000 texts will enable the user to make 250 texts abroad for nothing, although o2 do not guarantee this service it has always worked for us. I renegotiated my package on March 31st 2010 to a sim only contract giving me 300 calls a month and unlimited texts. Before I did so I spoke to customer services at CPW to ask them if I could use my mobile for texting abroad on the basis of 4 for 1 and they confirmed that it normally works but not guaranteed. Their statement implied that all SMS made abroad would come out of my monthly allowance.We went to Vegas in April/May 2010 and on return there were charges for making SMS amounting to £44.50. I queried this with CPW and they agreed to refund these because the sales department incorrectly advised me when I renegotiated my contract. We are going to Vegas again at the end of the year and I have told CPW that they must honour their agreement but they have told me that they cannot and have offered me £50 against all future texts until the end of my contract. Alternatively they have offered me my PAC code to transfer to another provider which I thought was very rude. I have now read that CPW have stopped unlimited texts being used abroad as from the end of February 2010 but I was not told that. This is extremely unfair as each text costs 25p from another country and costs can quickly mount up. Has anyone had a similar circumstance and if so how was it resolved