Vodafone's 'Minute Rounding' deemed unfair

Buzby

The ASA has ruled that Vodafone (who offer inclusive minute bundles) did not prominently explain that all calls are rounded UP to the next minute, effectively decimating the available 'time' customers have to make calls - many are unable to achieve anything like the promised inclusive duration.

Sadly, this being the ASA, they cannot prohibit such sneaky tactics - only ensure the network gives greater prominence to the fact that 10 calls of ten seconds each (a total connection time of 1 minute 40 seconds) will be charged as if a 10 minute call).

There is no technical reason why they cannot bill by the second, they all do this anyway - the call rounding is simply added to increase the bottom line.

This is of course doubly galling, as networks report 80% of customers don't use up their full inclusive allowance - so they make on his too!

NFH

The whole practice of rounding up quantities should be made illegal, whether it is phone calls, parking charges or anything else. Rounding up is simply overcharging built into the T&Cs or a means of legitimising a misleading indication of price.

Imagine if the same happened when you bought goods such petrol or loose vegetables in the supermarket. Nobody would tolerate it but for some reason legislators have turned a blind eye when it comes to services.

grumbler

Well, this is arguable. They always have to round to something. If it's 1 second you'll start demanding 0.1s etc.
Some goods are sold in packs only. They sell talktime in packs of 1 minute.

Just playing a devil's advocate...

d123

I've just noticed that GiffGaff do this as well, so not just a Voda thing.

For example, the £7.50 goody bag allowance should be listed as 200 calls (if less than a minute long), its almost a scam when a 200 minute allowance could theoretically be used up in under 3 and a half minutes of use.

d123

grumbler wrote: »

Well, this is arguable. They always have to round to something. If it's 1 second you'll start demanding 0.1s etc.
Some goods are sold in packs only. They sell talktime in packs of 1 minute.

Just playing a devil's advocate...

The vast majority of allowances are billed per second, to bill per second is not unreasonable, the systems are in place to do it.

Buzby

I seriously doubt anyone would be anal enough to insist on 0.1 sec resolution on billing.

However when BT dispensed with meter pulsing (when all calls were charged in 'units') the showed a picture of a 1p coin saying you'll pay exactly the cost of the call, and not lose out. Then 8 years later introduce rounding to recreate the same scenario?

They do it, because they can - but I'm sure it will return as a marketing ploy, but only after the prices are seriously hiked.