Three Pay Monthly Extra Charges

SpooD

Hello, I wondered if someone could help me with something please? I have been a customer of Three since 2011 when I signed up for a two year contract when I got a new phone with them. I continued with the same contract long after the two year period ended and only in April of this year went onto a SIM only All-you-can-eat data and 200mins pay monthly contract in an effort to reduce my monthly outgoings.

At the time of changing my contract, there was no mention of a £100 credit limit which gets charged when you exceed your minutes allowance nor the fact that you may need to cap your credit limit. What's more, there was never any warning to say that you are coming close to your minutes allowance. So now, instead of a £20 a month phone bill, I have a bill for £120 for last month and £40 for next month. I feel that this is totally unfair and underhand as I wouldn't have changed contract had I known this. Or I would have bought a new phone which is what I was contemplating doing!

I raised this as a complaint with Three based on the advise provided in store however three are only prepared to offer a £50 credit note for all charges as I have been a loyal customer. has anyone experienced this? Any help would be appreciated. If this has happened to me, I wonder how many others have faced similar charges? Surely this is misselling?
Many thanks, Spoo

SpooD

I have just been discussing this issue at length with Three and they are not budging from their £50 credit note stance. They said that I should have been aware of the terms when I was signing and that they are not at liberty to mention all the T&Cs. It is the customers responsibility to know what they are signing up for.


I managed to find the contract that I had signed and no where are the charges or in fact anything of relevance mentioned. Instead, there is one sentence saying that the terms can be read online. There is nothing here that smacks of transparency from Three and it seems that they are taking advantage of customers. Fuming!!

d123

SpooD wrote: »

At the time of changing my contract, there was no mention of a £100 credit which gets charged when you exceed your minutes allowance nor the fact that you may need to cap your credit limit. What's more, there was never any warning to say that you are coming close to your minutes allowance.

Any links to what you are talking about? How does a £100 credit even get charged? That would make it a debit...

It's not something I have seen or heard about before.

SpooD

Hi Dave,

I should clarify that 'credit' was what the sales guy in the store used to explain the large phone bill. As I understand it, it's the maximum excess that gets charged against any calls that you make above your allowed minutes. In my case, I was allowed to make additional calls totalling £100 before I received a message saying that I had exceeded my call limit. I guess it's sort of like an overdraft limit that you are unaware that you have and only get notified when you have hit the max limit.

Thanks, Spoo

grumbler

Like for credit cards and current accounts (overdraft) the limit is 'soft' and doesn't work like a 'hard' cap.

http://www.three.co.uk/Privacy_Cookies/Terms_Conditions%3Fcontent_aid%3D1214305745245

6.17 ...We may set a credit limit on your account until you have established a good payment history with us or if you fail to pay your account on time. .... If you exceed the credit limit we set, we may Suspend any or all of the 3 Services you use until you have made a payment to your account. You should not use the credit limit for budgeting as the amount you owe is not capped or limited by any credit limit we set.

However, AFAIK, Three do offer setting a hard cap on your request.

cifpower

I'm confused. The OP had a contract offering 200 minutes of calls free. They used well in excess of this and were charged accordingly as stated in the contract they agreed. What exactly are they annoyed about?

grumbler

They were under impression that extra charges for exceeding allowances were limited by £100, i.e. the services had to stop when the limit was reached.

This is a pretty common delusion caused mainly by Three's sales persons' misleading statements.

redux

It sounds to me like the thing to do is review the usage and go for a larger monthly bundle.

cifpower

redux wrote: »

It sounds to me like the thing to do is review the usage and go for a larger monthly bundle.

Exactly. Why would you buy a contract with a limit of 200 free minutes knowing you will go over and hoping to be capped at £100? Madness.

gonzo127

cifpower wrote: »

Exactly. Why would you buy a contract with a limit of 200 free minutes knowing you will go over and hoping to be capped at £100? Madness.

oh i was reading it that the complaint was that it wasn't capped at a lower value, so that the op didn't go over by so much.

saying that considering they must have gone over their allowance by nearly 300 mins to have hit to £100 cap, I would have hoped the op would have realised that they was using it so much over the included allowance, and been prepared for a large bill knowing that all mobile phones charge a lot of out of allowance mins

d123

SpooD wrote: »

Hi Dave,

I should clarify that 'credit' was what the sales guy in the store used to explain the large phone bill. As I understand it, it's the maximum excess that gets charged against any calls that you make above your allowed minutes. In my case, I was allowed to make additional calls totalling £100 before I received a message saying that I had exceeded my call limit. I guess it's sort of like an overdraft limit that you are unaware that you have and only get notified when you have hit the max limit.

Thanks, Spoo

OK, sounds like you only passed the credit check subject to a £100 deposit. That's a strange salesman who tried a spin a deposit as a credit.