Stolen Orange Mobile- massive bill

braydee89

Hi everyone,
This morning my sister received a letter from her bank claiming she had a direct debit payment of over £300 declined from Orange. Last month her phone was lost in the back of a taxi. She managed to contact the driver who said he would meet her to give the phone back, after four days of this and him not meeting up twice, she cancelled the sim and requested a new one.
Now she's been informed that in just one day he had racked up charges of £320 in calls to Iraq, apparently there is nothing Orange can do. She can't afford the payments and can't see any way of getting this sorted, does anyone know what she can do?
Thanks in advance
Braydee89

sqwiggle

Go to the police?

braydee89

What can the police do in this situation?

Jon_01

If they can prove it was him that made the calls they can charge him with fraud , but that wouldn't necessarily get the money back.

Unfortunately you're liable for all calls made until you report the phone as lost/stolen. The network would have no idea that the usage wasn't her until she did.
What she should have dune was report it to the network and then they could have blocked it until she got it back. At this point al she can do is ask for time to pay it off. Not the answer you want, sorry...

masterlumps

how did she contatc the driver?

was it by calling her own number? how would she even know it was the driver, could of been any one of numerous fares he picked up after she got out, could be hard to prove anything

braydee89

@masterlumps this is the issue, she called her own phone in the hope he was genuine, this is a case of her being too naive I think. The guy said he was the driver and that he would meet her, after two failed meet ups in four days she then cancelled the sim. I'm not sure there is much we can do.

d123

If she knew someone else had her phone why didn't she ring orange and have the sim restricted, it would have taken a few minutes and would have stopped any outgoing calls. Pretty sure the terms of service actually say if you lose your phone you are responsible for all calls up till the time you report the loss to the network.

masterlumps

did she book or flag the taxi? if she booked it she could call the taxi office and they may be able to establish whether or not it actually was the driver that answered the phone

braydee89

@d123 that's good advice which I'll make her aware to do if this happens again, tbh no one in my family had thought of limiting the sim.

@masterlumps, it was a flagged taxi on a night out, she can't remember the firm, I get the feeling this is dead in the water.

Thanks for helping everyone.
Braydee89

izzy_flint

go to the police and explain everything. They will be able to trace the calls made with the phone and use the numbers to find out who used the phone etc and maybe get them to pay the charges or get them charged with fraudulent use of a lost/stolen mobile.

DUTR

Your sister will be responsible for any calls made on the sim until such tome she informed the service provider, the phone was not stolen as per the title but mislaid, I don't think she will have much of a case in court, can you not loan her the money for this bill?