Vodafone overcharged me for data roaming and dont follow EU laws

Yonatan_2000

I am very disappointed from Vodafone.

I have been using my mobile abroad regularly, and pay £2 for 25MB of internet usage. Whenever I reach the cap, I receive a text message which alerts me and then I switch it off to make sure I will not be overly charged.

This week I have been staying with my family for Christmas in Spain, and now on Christmas EVE I was notified of an unbilled usage of £122 for internet usage abroad. I called customer services and was told that I used 187MB ! when I told Vodafone representative that I ALWAYS received a text message alerting me of almost reaching the limit, she said that they never do it - which is a lie because I always did.
Moreover, by law there is a 50 EURO cap on roaming charges -which Vodafone "forgot" to let me know or show on the bill, and the person at customer services didn't know what it was about.

I really don’t understand how can a company behave like that towards its customers and expect them to stay with them. This is outrageous and extremely disappointing to see from a big mobile company such as Vodafone. Disgrace.

I am now in the process of making a complaint to Ofcom about this whole fiasco.

Yonatan.

Guys_Dad

If you want a speedy resolution, then try again with Vodafone CS, asking to speak to someone who has knowledge of the EU cap.

Probably best to wait till after the holidays. OFCOM will take ages to redirect you back to Voda to get resolution and you will have wasted time. This should be easy for a competent CS person to resolve.

Alternatively, if convenient, go into a Voda shop for someone there to advise.

jem16

Yonatan_2000 wrote: »

I am now in the process of making a complaint to Ofcom about this whole fiasco.

Yonatan.

Or post on the Vodafone eforum and one of their Web Relations team should get back to you. They are much better at dealing with things than CS on 191.

vixmony

To be honest I have always found, the best way to get resolutions with vodafone is emailing the vodafone directors office and cc,customer services.

scheming_gypsy

Yonatan_2000 wrote: »

I have been using my mobile abroad regularly, and pay £2 for 25MB of internet usage. Whenever I reach the cap, I receive a text message which alerts me and then I switch it off to make sure I will not be overly charged.

This week I have been staying with my family for Christmas in Spain, and now on Christmas EVE I was notified of an unbilled usage of £122 for internet usage abroad. I called customer services and was told that I used 187MB ! when I told Vodafone representative that I ALWAYS received a text message alerting me of almost reaching the limit, she said that they never do it - which is a lie because I always did.
Moreover, by law there is a 50 EURO cap on roaming charges -which Vodafone "forgot" to let me know or show on the bill, and the person at customer services didn't know what it was about.

.

Now from other threads, and somebody will correct me if I'm wrong.... but doesn't a data package opt you out of the Euro cap?

grumbler

This was my thought, but then I checked and found that they just charged £2 for up to 25Mb per day.
Now I checked it again and they seem to have changed the wording:

Standard data costs abroad
In Europe
Using data abroad in our Europe zone is now easier with Vodafone Data Traveller - Europe. You pay just £1.67 (exc. VAT) a day (midnight to midnight, UK time) for 25MB. If you have a Vodafone Business Essentials price plan costing £35 a month or more, we’ll automatically waive the £1.67 daily fee for Vodafone Data Traveller in our Europe zone as it’s included in your plan.

We’ll send you free texts to remind you of your daily allowance and let you know if you’re nearing your data limit. If you use the full 25MB and want to continue using data, you’ll pay 85p a MB up to 5MB, then £4.25 for every 5MB after that.

I cannot find anything about the costs without Vodafone Data Traveller that makes me thinking that they enroll you automatically.

Vodafone

Yonatan_2000 wrote: »

I am very disappointed from Vodafone.

I have been using my mobile abroad regularly, and pay £2 for 25MB of internet usage. Whenever I reach the cap, I receive a text message which alerts me and then I switch it off to make sure I will not be overly charged.

This week I have been staying with my family for Christmas in Spain, and now on Christmas EVE I was notified of an unbilled usage of £122 for internet usage abroad. I called customer services and was told that I used 187MB ! when I told Vodafone representative that I ALWAYS received a text message alerting me of almost reaching the limit, she said that they never do it - which is a lie because I always did.
Moreover, by law there is a 50 EURO cap on roaming charges -which Vodafone "forgot" to let me know or show on the bill, and the person at customer services didn't know what it was about.

I really don’t understand how can a company behave like that towards its customers and expect them to stay with them. This is outrageous and extremely disappointing to see from a big mobile company such as Vodafone. Disgrace.

I am now in the process of making a complaint to Ofcom about this whole fiasco.

Yonatan.

Hi Yonatan,

Apologies for us not picking this thread up sooner.

In the event that you still require assistance with this could you email your details across to us via the email address in our profile page here?

When sending your email please quote WRT135 - MSE Fao Lee in the subject line and include a link to your thread.

Thanks,

Lee

Web Relations Team

Vodafone UK

spiro

The amount they have charged you seem right for what they say you have used. The issue is that once you buy a data package you have opt'ed out of the EU rule. The other issue is the useage details have to be collated and get to your provider and they have to work out how much you have used. This is not necessarily in real time so can cause delays PLUS texts can, at busy times, take days to arrive. They are not an instant message service.

Yolina

Voda's message alert system for data roaming was totally hit and miss too when I was them (it was 5MB a day for free at the time). When I was roaming in EU, I would get a message saying I was nearing the end of my allowance for the day when actually I had only used just over half of it, and I would sometimes not get a message at all when I had in fact gone over (have a data counter on phone so I was aware). I see they haven't improved...

Edit: that was about 16 months ago, I did report the anomaly on their forum and one of the reps said they would look into it. I can quote the rep from said thread "I'm not sure why you've been alerted some days but not others. So that we can get to the bottom of this for you, I've forwarded the details you've provided onto our support team. As soon as we have an answer for you, we'll let you know" Obviously it all swiftly got forgotten because they never came back with an answer...
The thread on the Voda forum is here - notice the conflicting info from the various reps as well :rotfl: http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/t5/Pay-Monthly-Services/Inclusive-5MB-day-data-in-EU/m-p/485760/

Baron_Crespo

What are Vodaphone charging for data inside the EU now? According to the Eu site Europa they cannot charge more than 70 cents per MB.

NFH

Baron_Crespo wrote: »

What are Vodaphone charging for data inside the EU now? According to the Eu site Europa they cannot charge more than 70 cents per MB.

The cap for UK home networks is now 38.29365p/MB in parts of the EEA outside the EU VAT area (e.g. Norway, Canary Islands) and 45.95238p/MB in parts of the EEA inside the EU VAT area (e.g. Ireland, mainland Spain).