Mobile phone stolen abroad and used to make calls

Jamesk88

Hello,

I'm having a meltdown here and was recommended to here for advice

I got my shiney new iPhone 4s a month ago. Last week I was in Barcelona and my phone was stolen early in the morning on the 19th April around 2am. I went straight to the police station but had to return at 12pm for someone who spoke english

In the morning I got the sim blocked with o2 around 9.45am (UK time) and went to the police station to get a report at 12pm. At this point there were no calls made from it on the o2 website so I thought I'd gotten away with that

I sent the forms away to my mobile insurance (RBS Royalties Gold) to get the phone replaced yesterday, however I just realized today that my monthly usage is now at £948!! (excluding VAT, which pushes it past £1100). I called o2 and they said it sometimes takes a while for the calls to appear and that they would look at wiping the calls made after the phone was barred, but that still leaves it around £800. I'm going to phone my insurance on Monday and tell them to update the form with this new information, I'm assuming they will want copies of the bills but that will be fine

The mobile phone insurance area on the RBS site say they cover stolen handsets up to £1000 and unauthorized calls (which I'm assuming is this) up to £1500 for contract phones (which mine is). It says you must report it to your carrier within 48 hours and the local police within 48 hours (I done both in about 12)

My friends are saying it should be perfectly fine since I done everything you are meant to and in plenty of time, but it's obviously still a lot of money. Has anyone here experianced similiar? Was it easy to fix if you got it done in time? Is there something I should watch for if they ask or some loophole they may try and find? I'm seriously worried and would greatly appreciate any advice from those who have seen this before. I've never claimed on insurance ever and am worried my lack of experiance with this will land me in a pile of debt =( Should the bank be OK with this, or do I have a struggle ahead? :mad:

Thanks in advance!

gjchester

Jamesk88 wrote: »

Hello,

I'm having a meltdown here and was recommended to here for advice

I got my shiney new iPhone 4s a month ago. Last week I was in Barcelona and my phone was stolen early in the morning on the 19th April around 2am. I went straight to the police station but had to return at 12pm for someone who spoke english

In the morning I got the sim blocked with o2 around 9.45am (UK time) and went to the police station to get a report at 12pm. At this point there were no calls made from it on the o2 website so I thought I'd gotten away with that

I sent the forms away to my mobile insurance (RBS Royalties Gold) to get the phone replaced yesterday, however I just realized today that my monthly usage is now at £948!! (excluding VAT, which pushes it past £1100). I called o2 and they said it sometimes takes a while for the calls to appear and that they would look at wiping the calls made after the phone was barred, but that still leaves it around £800. I'm going to phone my insurance on Monday and tell them to update the form with this new information, I'm assuming they will want copies of the bills but that will be fine

The mobile phone insurance area on the RBS site say they cover stolen handsets up to £1000 and unauthorized calls (which I'm assuming is this) up to £1500 for contract phones (which mine is). It says you must report it to your carrier within 48 hours and the local police within 48 hours (I done both in about 12)

My friends are saying it should be perfectly fine since I done everything you are meant to and in plenty of time, but it's obviously still a lot of money. Has anyone here experianced similiar? Was it easy to fix if you got it done in time? Is there something I should watch for if they ask or some loophole they may try and find? I'm seriously worried and would greatly appreciate any advice from those who have seen this before. I've never claimed on insurance ever and am worried my lack of experiance with this will land me in a pile of debt =( Should the bank be OK with this, or do I have a struggle ahead? :mad:

Thanks in advance!

You pay for calls until it's reported stolen, after that it's the networks cost.

Foreign calls are not recorded in real time so you would be responsible for calls between the loss and 9-45am. Unfortunatly you need to just sit tight till all the calls come back to your bill but it sounds like you should be covered.

Sios you have a PIN code on the SIM or Phone? If you did it may be that thats protected you to some extent as if they are set it makes it harder for the theif to make calls.

wantmemoney

Jamesk88 wrote:

Hello,

I'm having a meltdown here and was recommended to here for advice

I got my shiney new iPhone 4s a month ago. Last week I was in Barcelona and my phone was stolen early in the morning on the 19th April around 2am. I went straight to the police station but had to return at 12pm for someone who spoke english

In the morning I got the sim blocked with o2 around 9.45am (UK time) and went to the police station to get a report at 12pm. At this point there were no calls made from it on the o2 website so I thought I'd gotten away with that

@Jamesk88

When your UK o2 phone is switched on in Spain it connects to the Spanish Network o2 UK has the billing agreement with.

In your case it will be Telefonica

http://www.telefonica.com/en/about_telefonica/html/telefonica_brands/at_identidad_marcas.shtml
Commercial brands
Under the new brand model, Movistar and O2 are the brands that will articulate the Telef!nica Group commercial offer with a clear focus on the customer.
The new brand model aims to promote the integrated operating model with an integrated offer of products and services in an increasingly convergent and competitive environment.

In effect you connected to 'o2 Spain' (Telefonica).

When your phone is first switched on in Spain it connects to 'o2 Spain' which then calls o2 UK to do the 'credit check' (anti-fraud). This is to protect o2.

It checks to see if the account is a brand new customer account or if it as been billed previously.

If it is a new account o2 Spain gets the red flag and the UK credit limit will be applied by o2 Spain.
o2 Spain will cut the phone off if they see abnormal high use.

If the account is 'billable' o2 Spain will get a green flag. If they see abnormal high use on their system will ignore it.

When you report the phone stolen to o2 UK you should ask yourself why this doesn't send a red flag to o2 Spain (in the same way as their credit check does) and people still end up with higher bills because billing isn't done in 'real time'.

Any way hopefully your insurance will cover you against all this 'billing'.

Jamesk88

Thank you for your replies

@gjchester

I'm just off with o2 again and they are going to refund me £347 as that is the calls made after the bar. Still leaves me with £791 to pay, but at least now I have a figure to tell the insurance. I just hope they aren't !!!!!y because I didn't tell them when I made the original claim that there is now airtime abuse. I wasn't to know though until it appeared on the o2 website and when it did they were shut (same as today) so I couldn't tell them!

Hindsight is a brilliant thing eh? I've only had the phone a month and was still getting familiar with it. I've never used a pin on any phones in my life. Rest assured that will change now. Couldn't they just stick the SIM in another phone anyway?


@wantmemoney

The provider I was connected to over there was Movistar, if that makes any difference. You are right though, I'm stunned that their network wouldn't flag up that a UK phone that has entered Spain and runs up over £1100 worth of calls to the same number within 8 hours, over and over, wouldn't raise alarm bells.


I saw something today that worried me on the insurance T&C. regarding airtime abuse:

"If, after the loss or theft of your phone, someone uses it
without your permission and your incur costs for airtime
abuse, we will cover you up to a maximum of £1,500
for that airtime abuse (contract phones only). Cover applies
only to the airtime charges incurred by a third party
following loss or theft of your phone and commences
12 hours before you have notified the police, the airtime
provider and us."

That last bit, about commencing 12 hours before you notify all THREE of them, seems a bit vague. So does it cover 12 hours before you notify the first of the three, the last, what? I told the police and o2 well within 12 hours but I couldn't tell the insurance till when I got home, which was at 4am the following morning so it was Friday before I could tell them. Is this something I should be worried about?

Thanks again for your replies

wantmemoney

stolen early in the morning on the 19th April around 2am

In the morning I got the sim blocked with o2 around 9.45am (UK time)


@Jamesk88

Keep to the Spanish time....when was the phone stolen? When was the phone blocked?

You do not pay charges after the phone was blocked

have you got the itemised bill that shows the times and dates of the calls.....you really must get that.

yes stupid me....Telephonica(o2) uses Movistar for Latin countries and no it makes no difference.

gjchester

Jamesk88 wrote: »

Couldn't they just stick the SIM in another phone anyway?

A Phone PIN locks the handset so they need to guess that (or reset it ) to get around it. Yes they could move the sim to another phone so thats where a SIM PIN comes in, When powered up if the SIM PIN is entered wrongly three times then the SIM needs an override PUK code, and if that is entered wrongly too many times the sim is locked permanaltly and you need to replace it.

You can get a PUK from a network pretty easily, O2 have an online service, but you need to know the phone number to do it, hopefully something the thief does not have to hand. By the time they can find it out hopefully you've had the SIM barred.

Jamesk88 wrote: »

You are right though, I'm stunned that their network wouldn't flag up that a UK phone that has entered Spain and runs up over £1100 worth of calls to the same number within 8 hours, over and over, wouldn't raise alarm bells.

Billing is never in real time, could it be, possibly, but to do so would entail re-jigging a lot of systems, with a log of potential problems, so solve a problem that (and I don't mean this to you nastily) is something that can be solved by the person who's phone is stolen having set up SIM and Phone PINS.

The bill could be run up before the foreign network send the billing data back to your UK network.

If you worked out the number of possible permuations of what phone could be roaming on what network (and remember they may roam across networks if your not in your home country so thats 2+ network to continually update) in what country then the data flow to sync all the accounts up in real time would be immense.

And Yes O2 is the same group as Teliphonica but that does not mean they have joined up billing, as Telifonica bought O2 a few years ago you can guarantee they'll have completly seperate billing system in p[lace with no real linkage.

Jamesk88 wrote: »

That last bit, about commencing 12 hours before you notify all THREE of them, seems a bit vague. So does it cover 12 hours before you notify the first of the three, the last, what?
Thanks again for your replies

The min aim is to make sure people are informed, to stop someone running up a huge bill then claiming it was stolen (hence the police report)/ I suspect it will be whichever is the first takes preceident and probably the network provider. It's also so you do them all not one or two and put the rest off.

Jamesk88

In Spanish time the phone was stolen around 2AM and I told o2 around 10.45AM. The calls didn't start till much later however after they had taken it, I guess this could be for any number of reasons though, probably off mugging someone else

I have the on-line bill that shows all the calls made and how much they cost. I don't know if they accept me printing this off though, and due to my actual bill not being made till the 12th of May, I'm thinking of just printing it off in the store and getting them to stamp it. The o2 rep I spoke to said this would be sufficient.

Jamesk88

@gjchester

Ah I see, I thought it was just for the handset itself. To be honest that's why I never done it in the past, I didn't think it made a huge difference and was more of an inconvenience. I'll make sure to correct this from now on!

Ah I see, I suppose that makes sense, they just receive it in one lump bulk. Would have thought there would at least be a cap on it though. I might see about getting one set up if all this mess is sorted out

Hopefully that will be the case as managing to notify all 3 within 12 hours while abroad at the early hours of the morning would be a bit of a feat

Everyone I've spoken to said everything looks to check out and there shouldn't be any problems. It's purely because of all the horror stories I have heard that has me worried. Thing is though, they all seem to have a catch, such as not reporting it quickly enough, not knowing it was stolen, not being able to tell the carrier in time, etc. No-one has mentioned anything with me that could mess the whole thing up so I'm hoping that a sign

Buzby

But the lesson here for anyone going abroad (or indeed, staying in the UK) is to activate and use both the SIM PIN and Handset PIN, which will lock out a thief when the phone is attempting to be used, or the SIM is transferred.

wantmemoney

wrote:

In Spanish time the phone was stolen around 2AM and I told o2 around 10.45AM. The calls didn't start till much later however after they had taken it, I guess this could be for any number of reasons though, probably off mugging someone else

you are not liable for any calls made after that time irrespective of when Movistar sent the bill/account to o2 UK....their billing dates and periods are of no concern to you....if calls have occured after that time it would indicate that o2 or whoever failed to block the SIM. :cool:

Jamesk88

But there were calls made before that time. Whoever stole it (or whoever they gave it to) started using calls from around 4.30am Spanish time. So between that time and when I reported it around 10.45am, I'm still liable for yea?

o2 will wipe the calls made after it as blocked, so all calls made after 10.45am will be refunded, but all calls before I've still to pay (which is when most of them were)

Next time I go abroad I'll be getting a case with a chain to put my phone in! That's assuming I get it back