help £1768.00 orange roaming charge bill

bmwbully

Hello All,
After some advice please.

Me and the wife have 2 Iphone 4`s on the same contract the usual monthly bill is about £80-£100. The wife went to turkey with the kids for a week and i stayed at home working. When the wife got to turkey we realized the phone had not had international roaming activated by orange and she could not phone home( this is the first time she had been away on her own) i phoned orange and told them the wife was in turkey and i needed the international roaming turned on. They told me they would send a text to the phone to activate it but there was no guarantee as she was outside Europe. When she got back we received the bill about 2 weeks later for £1768.00. To which we were shocked. The wife have been browsing the net and also letting the kids play game on websites. i phoned Orange to explain that i was not made aware of actual costs of roaming at the time of the call and also that no one had actual made us aware of the massive bill that was being run Up ( 17 times more than usual if it would have been a credit card company we usually get a call for large amounts abroad) I spoke to a manager who said she would look into this and because i was not offered any bundles at the time of the call to orange she might be able to give us a bundle deal now. After 2 months they cut the phones off last Thursday while i was working away in Glasgow. i had to go to a phone shop and buy a pay as you go phone because i couldn't phone them on my orange phone. After calling them they said because the bill was outstanding they Had cut the phones off until it was paid in full. I explained a decision had not been made and explained in full the story. I was put on hold for 40 minutes. She came back on and said she would email the manager and the phones would be reconnected for 48 hours just for the decision to be made. The next day she phoned back and said there was no deal to be made and the Bill needed to be paid in full and the phones would be cut off within the next 48 hours unless full payment was received. i asked about payment terms and was told the maximum length was 3 months i could pay it over. i feel really ripped off as i should have been warned or offered a bundle at the time. there is a new law for Europe which has a 50 euro limit set for roaming but because she was outside Europe this did not apply ( we are wiser now and the wife is still very upset she did use the INTERNET which i know i should have to pay for)

I just wanted to see if there is anything else i could do before paying this bill as i feel i have been ripped off without warning or any restrictions being put in place to protect the mobile phone user

just a warning to other user get all cost up front so you know what the cost will be upfront

any help would be appreciated

Paul

vintagegirl

there are loads of these stories around....it costs a fortune to use internet abroad

MisterBrico

Unfortunately all the charges and processes are in black and White in the terms and conditions which we are all guilty of not always reading.

There is little else to do except appeal to their better nature as you have used the service (roaming data) which is unfortunately very expensive. Somewhere in the t&c it also says you are liable for all charges

Wish I had better news really but unfortunately that's the way it is, all I can advice is ring up, be very polite and calm ( I know this is tough ) and try and get what you can.

Whatever the outcome good luck

grumbler

bmwbully wrote: »

i phoned Orange to explain that i was not made aware of actual costs of roaming at the time of the call

You could have blamed them if you asked, that was a very reasonable thing to do. However, you have not.

Would you blame BT for not making you aware of the international calls prices (more than £2/min to some countries)?

Also, either you or your wife (instead of just " browsing the net") could have easily checked this on the Orange website.

I apologise for not offering any help with getting the bill cut, but I can offer some help with searching instead:

£3000 Orange phone bill - another Data Roaming debacle

MarkBargain

I'm with T-Mobile and asked if they could cap the usage on my account to prevent just this sort of thing. They said they cannot. Surely it must be technically possible, but I guess these firms make a lot of money on people who don't realise the cost of using phones abroad. It really is a rip off that needs to be sorted out.

coolesticeking

I'm sorry to hear about this and it's a nasty shock but Orange like most ops do text you when roam onto a new network while roaming and it does tell you that Calls, Texts & Data are not included in any standard bundles that you use in the UK and a quick rundown of the costs.

It's always funny that no one says this when they post messages like this?! I've had these messages everytime i've gone onto a new roaming network from 3, Orange, O2, T-Mobile and Vodafone in the past.

Why does anybody think that by going abroad then it's going to cost the same to use the Internet as they do in the UK?

I'm sure people don't go into a supermarket abroad and say I only pay a quid for something at home and get clubcard points as well - is this the same here? I don't think so!!

Roaming is nothing new, it's been around for I don't know how many years now for both PAYG & Contract users.. It's been on telly, the internet about the costs and to ensure anything that is not required is switched off and don't use it unless you really need it!

If you really need to use the internet then use WiFi or an Internet Cafe.. Or use PAYG or a SIM from a local network to keep costs down..

Must have been a great holiday if the wife needs to use the net all the time and the kids want to play games.. I do that in the UK and don't need to pay extra for a holiday..

Rant over!! :mad:

coolesticeking

grumbler wrote: »

You could have blamed them if you asked, that was a very reasonable thing to do. However, you have not.

Would you blame BT for not making you aware of the international calls prices (more than £2/min to some countries)?

Also, either you or your wife (instead of just " browsing the net") could have easily checked this on the Orange website.

I apologise for not offering any help with getting the bill cut, but I can offer some help with searching instead:

£3000 Orange phone bill - another Data Roaming debacle

Yes, it's a shock - but I've heard I don't know how many of these posts now...

Common sense - I feel not many has this these days.

simax

Anytime you go abroad Orange will send a text welcoming you to the country and the cost for incoming and outbound calls, text messaging and data charges per MB.

No excuse.

OK_Sauce

MarkBargain wrote: »

I'm with T-Mobile and asked if they could cap the usage on my account to prevent just this sort of thing. They said they cannot. Surely it must be technically possible, but I guess these firms make a lot of money on people who don't realise the cost of using phones abroad. It really is a rip off that needs to be sorted out.

I would change providers then because O2 certainly do. My wife took her iPhone abroad and she asked for a £40 limit (over the inclusive charges) imposed on it which they did. They even said they would text if it got near the limit. Pretty good service all round I'd say.

System

MarkBargain wrote: »

I'm with T-Mobile and asked if they could cap the usage on my account to prevent just this sort of thing. They said they cannot. Surely it must be technically possible,

When you are abroad your account is not debited in real time. It is possible for 2 weeks to elapse before the foreign provider passes the bill to your provider.

grumbler

simax wrote: »

Anytime you go abroad Orange will send a text welcoming you to the country and the cost for incoming and outbound calls, text messaging and data charges per MB.

No excuse.

To be fair, this is how it normally works with pre-activated roaming.
The OP activated it from abroad, so you can only assume that they should have received the text.