Tesco mobile bill - son racked up huge debt accidentally

custardy

I'm really upset about this and wondered if there was something I could say to tesco as I want to complain but not in a horrible way because I honestly see both sides of the argument.

I read your post.

fact is you have no complaint
your son ran up the bill
you facilitated this
his ability to comprehend the finiancial impact is down to you,not Tesco
as i said before
accept your mistake
there is no two sides
you were the person who made the choices,Tesco have been very generous
if oyu can't afford to pay the bill,then you couldnt afford to give your son near unlimited spending power

MissKeith

I know that you didn't realise that contracts could be capped which is why I suggested for you to move your son to one. I don't feel as though I have been nasty or unhelpful, merely realistic. Just because the answers you had wasn't what you wanted to hear, it doesn't make them any less truthful. If you read my response at the top of this page, please heed it.

robbies_gal

i wasnt nasty and you admitted yourself he doesnt understand certain things so thats why i said why let him have a contract phone

someone has to take responsibility

grumbler

aquarian3 wrote: »

Grumbler: yes, my son didn't understand what the text meant, that is what I said. I'm not sure what you didn't understand about that - I admitted that he was admitting to not understanding a message along the lines of 'you are close to your usage'.

I am pretty sure you still have this text and can quote it more accurately.

I think by asking if he has my credit card I can only assume you are being childish? (we only have debit cards anyway).

Absolutely not. I just don't see much difference between giving a phone with uncapped contract and giving a credit/debit card to a child (unless it is is Visa Electron or Maestro that cannot be overdrawn, but even for these cards children have to be 16+ to have it on their own name).

At the time we took out the sims (as has already been mentioned by a poster without an attitude & with some intelligence) Tesco didn't offer capped contracts and I didn't know our phones weren't capped until my phone call to Tesco, I assumed £10 per month meant £10 per month and no more.

You didn't 'take' the sims. You signed the contracts, admittedly without reading them, but having made some assumptions instead. Otherwise you probably would have gone for a safe PAYG option instead that Tesco have been always offering.

It was only due to my son being ill in bed for 2 days that he managed to rack up his usage - this to me was unusual behaviour on our account and I'm surprised Tesco highlighted this only by sending a text to the sim in question - had the phone been stolen without our knowing, a bill could've occurred by the thief phoning abroad, how would a text message have helped in this situation?

This keeps happening with many people at various networks. That's why insurance policies exist that cover unouthorised usage (only to a certain extent normally). That's why you are supposed to protect your sim card with a PIN if you don't want to take the risk.

Yet if Tesco had a policy of sending the same message to the account holder, then a stop could've been put on the phone a number of different ways (ie by blocking the phone if stolen or by taking it away if misused).

What account holder? It's not like a credit card with the main account holder and additional card users. Tesco have a contract with you and they sent the text to your phone. Tesco are not supposed to know that you decided to give it to your son.

It's negative nasty people that make those in need think twice about posting and asking for help on forums like this and it's a shame there's no rule that 'if you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all' in other words; read it, don't post and move on!

I hope this is not addressed to me (among others). However, you came here for an advice, not for nice words. Otherwise, it's a wrong place and you should have visited some other one if you want nice words.

LJ21

Be careful if you decide to go with a 'capped' contract, I did this, network 3 decided when it didn't work, they wriggled out of it by saying , I shouldn't have relied on it, even though they firmly told me it would be safe, sadly these comments were not written, so I don't have a leg to stand on!!

grumbler

To be fair, '3', unlike Tesco and T-mobile, officially don't offer capped contracts. In your case it looks like some staff member incompetence and/or error rather than the network's.

robbies_gal

tesco do have capped contracts though theyre all over the place being advertised

visidigi

gabbyevs wrote: »

tesco do have capped contracts though theyre all over the place being advertised

he said unlike tesco and t-mobile... as in saying that tesco do have capped contracts...

nsabournemouth

Why do people sign a contract with a network and hand it over to children? Tesco have gone above and beyond what is expected of them here. You signed the contract, pay up. It's as simple as that. These posts are becoming more and more frequent.

jonewer

This thread is a great advert for tesco mobile.

OP, I think (and I know I'm probably being impertinent here) that is is an excellent opportunity to teach your son some responsibility.

He done it rong. Now he cant use his phone for a while. He needs to learn to live with the consequences of his actions.