Help me with o2 and a huge phone bill!

mj2000uk

Not trying to blame anyone, just asking for some help from a customer who has been loyal to them.

Anyway guys, here is how the story ends. I called o2 this afternoon and asked to wait, no matter how long, for the most senior person I could speak to.

A few things happened.

I advised them of the situation and re-iterated I have 3 phones on contract with them where the contracts would not be renewed when they expire.

I advised that for the 4 years prior to the current 2, no shock bills have ever come through.

I advised them that in the last 6 years, one way or another, my spend with o2 has been around 3K.

I advised them that I would tell every sole that listened that they would not empathise with me and work to a solution.

I told them I work as a data analyst with Ofcom.

Low and behold, they have now posted a £300.00 credit to my account so the whole charade cost me around 50 quid.

I am now back to being a happy o2 customer.

Herongull

But you haven't solved the real problem. You have given a contract sim with essentially unlimited credit (that you are responsible for) to a highly irresponsible teen. You have then rewarded the teen for irresponsible behaviour.

What will happen next? Let me guess. This positive reinforcement will lead the teen will start running up more huge bills by phoning premium numbers or using the phone credit to buy things.

Then you have another huge bill. They won't let you off a second time, whatever you think.

Or perhaps the phone will be lost or stolen and the teen "forgets" to report it? More huge bills.

The only solution is to take the sim out of his phone and put it in a drawer until it expires. Or if the teen refuses to hand it over, have it blocked. The teen can use PAYG and learn how to budget.

mj2000uk

I agree whole heartedly but one step at a time....

V_For_Verminator

Firstly, well done on getting the money credited back. Common sense from o2 (for a change.)

Secondly, I wonder how many stern words have been exchanged?!

mj2000uk

V_For_Verminator wrote: »

Firstly, well done on getting the money credited back. Common sense from o2 (for a change.)

Secondly, I wonder how many stern words have been exchanged?!

No, never result to insults.

Lots of talk about switching and lots of talk about partnerships!

pmduk

Don't o2 give you the opportunity to monitor current usage on their website? It won't stop the problem, but gives you a chance to intervene before a bill gets out of hand. Just don't renew the phone contract for the lad.

NB I've never been an o2 contract customer so can't be certain this is possible.

powerful_Rogue

mj2000uk wrote: »

I told them I work as a data analyst with Ofcom.

Whats that got to do with anything?

Must say im very dissapointed with O2 for backing down in this situation. Id certainly never give them my custom.

d123

powerful_Rogue wrote: »

Must say im very dissapointed with O2 for backing down in this situation. Id certainly never give them my custom.

It's the same for all networks, it's easier for the manager to give a one-off goodwill gesture to a hysterical or ranting customer to get rid of them.

Next time round they can just say you knew what the child was doing, this time you pay your bill as you knew what was going on.

I cannot believe the OP is so "soft" (other words seem more insulting than I'm trying to convey) in being burnt by the child and blaming the network, and after getting a second chance still doesn't seem capable of making a decision to remove the contract sim and substituting a more suitable PAYG like Giffgaff that would still give unlimited texts and 250 or 500 minutes for £12/£10.

BadBehaviour

mj2000uk wrote: »

Morning,

Please, someone inspire me!

Here is a very concise situation.....

We have a teenager who is not living with us, we provide teenager with a mobile phone. The teenager knows that the mobile has a tariff of 300 minutes and unlimited texts. This has never been a problem and each month, the bill comes in around 17.50.

In the last 2 months, the teenager has run up ridiculous bills. We have one for over £250.00 and we have one for £90.00.

Before anyone points out the obvious things that everyone thinks. No, we do not monitor the bill daily as we have no reason to expect a huge bill.

We have now moved the teenager onto a new tariff which includes unlimited minutes and texts.

The problem was that the teenager started making hour long midnight calls to his girlfriend and this exceeded his allowance very quickly.

So, as a loyal customer of o2, I called and asked for help. While they were sympathetic, they declined any help and on pressing them, they would not refund anything but they offered to submit a case for a full or partial credit to the account to a value.

I have not had this case approved and was read out that the usage of the phone is my responsibility and mine alone.

So, instead of tearing a strip off the poor lady who delivered this news, I am about to email them to appeal against their decision.

I am sure there will be some "matter of fact" advice that people want to give me so please see a list of "things already considered".

1 - I cannot kill the teenager, we were all young once!
2 - The teenager is not in a position to pay the bill himself and I am not in a position to deduct it from any money we give him. We dont give him any money!
3 - I cannot take the phone from the teenager as ultimately, while I am very angry, I cannot cut our only method of communication off.
4 - I cannot rely on the teenager to monitor their own usage, it would be easier to split an atom on my kitchen table.

I am let down by o2 here. Usually they are OK but they did not make any effort to inform me when the minutes exceeded, they do not block usage when suddenly a phone starts racking up a huge bill and they do not switch automatically to another tariff when the current tariff is exceeded.

I am putting pen to paper to them shortly, any advice would be welcomed!

Regards

Mike

I know this thread is not too recent, but I couldn't refrain from expressing my opinion.

If you can't rely on the teenager to keep an eye on his allowance, then you should have done it and more so since it's YOUR contract. Doesn't cost much time or effort to do that online regularly.
I can't believe you would blindly trust a teenager (and you said it yourself he doesn't care about monitoring his usage, which doesn't seem that much to ask of him, since he is not the one forking out the money after all, no?).


You got what you want from O2, so make sure son doesn't repeat the mistake once again, because then I doubt O2 will let you off once more.

robbies_gal

im also annoyed o2 backed down you use it you pay for it fed up of all these my teenager used up a bill how could the network let them threads