£278 Vodafone bill for one call

melanie2a

I need some advice please ...

Last Monday vodaphone took a dd from my bank acct for £278, my bill is normally £21. I rarely make calls from my phone, generally I text and use internet as we have poor signal at my home

When I phoned them they said I had been connected to an 0843 number for 12 hours 3 minutes and 4 seconds from 1530 to 330. They said they could tell it had to be some kind of mistake. They offered 50 off the bill

I managed to reverse the dd and I have paid my £21 contract charge by card

I spoke to a manager today who said I must have pocket calked and not noticed my phone was connected. He said because it's a premium no it doesn't hang up as they make money from the calls. I don't answer these calls on my phone cos they are usually trying to sell me something I don't want! They say they accept that I didn't make the small fir 12 hours but I'm still liable. I have asked that it's escalated further.

On the day of the call my mobile phone died completely. I couldn't turn it on or off, I even posted this on my fb account in case anyone tried to get in touch with me.

I don't gave the money to pay this bill and I'm terrified. I'm at home with my little girl and we don't have very much money. I'm not really sure what to do. I daren't turn my phone on now

Humphrey10

melanie2a wrote: »

On the day of the call my mobile phone died completely. I couldn't turn it on or off

Was it on, or was it off?

melanie2a wrote: »

I daren't turn my phone on now

Turn it on, and look at the call history - did your phone make the call or not?

SteveHenshaw

Go to the daily mail, they usually publish stories about this.

In all honestly is sounds made up from what have you have said. You're phone died for 12 hours, you posted on facebook it was dead and now its working again?

The only explanation would be a rogue app that is dialing premium rate numbers whilst making your phone unresponsive. But I doubt that.

NFH

melanie2a wrote: »

When I phoned them they said I had been connected to an 0843 number for 12 hours 3 minutes and 4 seconds from 1530 to 330.

You're not giving us the whole story. Whose 0843 number is it? Was it a number you had ever called from your phone? Try Googling it if you don't immediately recognise it, within quotes in the format "0843 XXX XXXX".

melanie2a

I posted here for help, not to be ridiculed

Basically my I was out with my little girl. I went to text my husband, my phone was not responsive, I tried pressing the back buttons and the on off and nothing, I tried putting it into the car charger, nothing.

I have had problems on and off with the phone turning off when I make calls, text, generally try to use it fir anything. It's a cheap huiwei phone because I can't afford a nice phone

When I got home I posted on fb because I thought my phone had given up the ghost and that I would have to try and charge up an old one and use that until my contract ends and I text a lot so I didn't want anyone to think I was being rude by not responding. When I picked up the phone the next day to get the SIM card the light came on and it said connect to charger so I did

I didn't think anything if it and since I hadn't used my phone to call since the previous day I didn't panic

If you would like to respond to the post please can you do it kindly because I already feel like crying and I can't really understand why you would be mean when I'm asking fir help and advice.

melanie2a

The number is 0843 4108 176

NFH

melanie2a wrote: »

The number is 0843 4108 176

Five days ago, someone called Mel posted a comment about this number at http://whocallsme.com/Phone-Number.aspx/08434108176 asking "Don't know who this is". Was this you?

My guess is that this is a rogue app, as suggested above. Does it appear in your call history? Have you ever dialled it on purpose?

melanie2a

Yes, that was me, when I googled the no originally I couldn't find it but when I tried in the format you said it came up as a PPI firm.

I have just rechecked my call logs and I received a call from that no at 1134am, but did not answer it. My daughter takes a nap from 1030-1200 so my phone was on silent. I don't call back any of those 08 numbers because they are PPI/accident claim people and they drive me nuts!

Thank you for helping, I really appreciate it.

NFH

Did Vodafone supply the phone to you as well as the service? If so and if the phone locking up was a result of a defect in the phone, you could hold Vodafone liable for the price of the call under the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982. If it was a rogue app (which doesn't sound like the case here), then the liability would be yours.

forgotmyname

If it were a rogue app there would be lots of posts saying they got stung for a huge bill.

Possibly a marketing call (although a search on the number brings up nothing except i presume the OP's question asking who owns it). And somehow you managed to dial it.

If the phone doesnt switch on the 1st thing i do is pull the battery or reset it.

Thats some phone with a 12h+ battery life whilst making a call.

melanie2a

It's not the original contract phone . My little girl threw my contract phone in the bath (Learnt a hard lesson that day) and when I took it to phones 4 you (who sorted out my original contract with vodaphone in July 2012). They said the contract doesn't cover water damage so I was going to buy a cheap Nokia off ebay but they talked me into a HuiWei phone for £60. I've had problems with it on and off since I bought it, I don't think the software is very stable but I'm no expert in these things so it might have been my poor it skills.

I might go and see them as the phone is fairly new and see if there is something wrong with it!