T-Mobile; another huge bill due to thievery

gjchester

imaginarynumber wrote: »

Just out of interest, I ask because I don't know the answer, if I go on holiday for a month and come home and discover that someone has broken into my home and left all my gas/water appliances running and have been stealing my electricity- would the service contract suppliers roll their eyes (in disbelief) and pursue me for the full amount or as a victim of a crime would the service provider have to take a partial hit?

You'd be liable in full, it's not the service provider fault you got broken into, how are they expected to know if your at home with all the lights and heating on or it's someone elses doing.

imaginarynumber

Thanks gjchester, was wondering if the service provider were deemed to be a victim in any sense. BTW would your house hold insurance cover you (even though it probably wouldnt cover the phone senario)?

I am pretty ignorant re the difference between providing credit and a service that translates to unlimited credit. I assume that my bank for example is a service provider yet I am not liable if my cheque book is stolen...

Re the kid who is trying to commuicate with their mum, I am not sure that this would apply as we are talking about people that have lost their phones and are looking at bills that have jumped by hundreds of pounds in a 24 hour period because of the calling of premium rate/international numbers. Even the dumbest of kids is unlikely to run a bill up by that much.

With regard to disrupting a customers service, fair enough, there are good reasons to argue against it. Why then not ask customers at what level they want to have some kind of disruption, eg after every £50 per day (businesses could opt into a no cap). You could then have a text telling them to call customer services and you could insist that they put a pin number in to un bar outgoing calls. This could be completely automated and be removed in minutes.

I would be happy to gamble £50 rather than having to enter my pin each time I wanted to look at the time on my phone/make a call/see if I have an email.

gjchester

imaginarynumber wrote: »

Thanks gjchester, was wondering if the service provider were deemed to be a victim in any sense. BTW would your house hold insurance cover you (even though it probably wouldnt cover the phone senario)?.

You'd have to read the policy, they vary so much who knowns.

imaginarynumber wrote: »

I am pretty ignorant re the difference between providing credit and a service that translates to unlimited credit. I assume that my bank for example is a service provider yet I am not liable if my cheque book is stolen...

It's about duty of care.

If you cheque book is stolen and cheques are written and signed but not by you then the chances are (and this is from experience) they'll go through but if you query them and show it's not your signiture then you'll likely get the back.

If you presign all the cheques in the cheque book to save time then lose it then you out of luck, you will be liable.

imaginarynumber wrote: »

Re the kid who is trying to commuicate with their mum, I am not sure that this would apply as we are talking about people that have lost their phones and are looking at bills that have jumped by hundreds of pounds in a 24 hour period because of the calling of premium rate/international numbers. Even the dumbest of kids is unlikely to run a bill up by that much.

More likely is the kid doesn't understand the value and it's lost / stolen at school during the day. He / She doesn't want to tell parents for fear of a scolding and the bill gets run up by someone else then finds it's unusable in the evening.

imaginarynumber wrote: »

With regard to disrupting a customers service, fair enough, there are good reasons to argue against it. Why then not ask customers at what level they want to have some kind of disruption, eg after every £50 per day (businesses could opt into a no cap). You could then have a text telling them to call customer services and you could insist that they put a pin number in to un bar outgoing calls. This could be completely automated and be removed in minutes.

I would be happy to gamble £50 rather than having to enter my pin each time I wanted to look at the time on my phone/make a call/see if I have an email.

People can't remember PINS they'll trite it down, most likely on the phone.

As I said this is a minpority of people therew ould have to be a lot of expense to write / test / impliment the system to save a few people, who would most likely just reply to the text without reading it.

Your crediting people with more responsibility than they usually want to take.

As Jon01 said billing is never real time, it would be hard to do this. Someone asked why does PAYG work in real time then and I don't know but it seems to.

With regards your PIN I cna understand the bother, I didn't bother for a long time and now I do. Not because of loss but because of friends who have had a loss, thnakfully they seem to have lsot it not stolen it, but it did make me think. It's just a matter of getting used to doing it.

imaginarynumber

gjchester wrote: »

More likely is the kid doesn't understand the value and it's lost / stolen at school during the day. He / She doesn't want to tell parents for fear of a scolding and the bill gets run up by someone else then finds it's unusable in the evening.



People can't remember PINS they'll trite it down, most likely on the phone.

Ironically I find that with the advent of social networking on handsets, kids are the most likely to pin lock their phones, primarilly to prevent parents from snooping on them.

I am more likely to start locking my phone when i eventually get my next Windows Phone, to be honest this will be primarilly to prevent others from reading my emails etc in the event that i lose it. I would expect that the odds of someone nicking my phone to access premium rate numbers is pretty low. It's a gamble that I am willing to take, in the same why that I choose not to hide my cash from muggers in my socks when out and about.

Never-the-less I do feel that that the telcos/phone makers could do more and at little cost/inconvinience.

regards

gjchester

imaginarynumber wrote: »

I would expect that the odds of someone nicking my phone to access premium rate numbers is pretty low.

Absolutly. Someone nicks your phone it's to sell on, the fact they can make calls in a bonus.

Guys_Dad

gjchester wrote: »

Absolutly. Someone nicks your phone it's to sell on, the fact they can make calls in a bonus.

Usually I agree with you 100% but not this time. What's the value of a mobile on the street that is going to be locked/barred? £100? £200 for a premium phone?

But MSE members post call charges of way in excess of that being rung up in 24 hours if overseas calls made.

So I would say that it totally depends upon who steals the phone. Like mobile contracts, there are two separate items - the handset and the service. Both have value dependant upon who steals the phone.

gjchester

Guys_Dad wrote: »

Usually I agree with you 100% but not this time. What's the value of a mobile on the street that is going to be locked/barred? £100? £200 for a premium phone?

But MSE members post call charges of way in excess of that being rung up in 24 hours if overseas calls made.

So I would say that it totally depends upon who steals the phone. Like mobile contracts, there are two separate items - the handset and the service. Both have value dependant upon who steals the phone.

True

There must be thousands of mobile stolen each day, I'm sure some are stolen with the primary intention of using others credit, but the vast majority will be sold on as is to somewhere outside the UK that won't have the IMEI's blocked.