£542 data charge from talk talk (not even left the uk)

natashasj

Ok im new here desperate from some advice.
To start with i hate talk talk. Hate isnt strong enough to decsribe how i feel. Unfortunately im stuck in contract with them until next year.
This morning i woke to 2 texts from them. The first said id been cut off for going over my mobile data allowance for the month. The second said that as of the 3rd of July at 22.54pm i had 600 meg of data left. Today is the 5th of july and i received that at 7am.
So i checked my talk talk app and nearly had heart failure when i read £542 worth of charges.
Now heres some facts.
Last november i went over my call allowance by accident (business phone broke so used my personal phone). They cut me off at £40. It was all really quick.
And i have a usage limit of £25 on my account.
How on earth do i deal with this.
I checked my talktalk app yesterday morning knowing i was almost at my limit and it said i had about 600 meg left.
I cant even bring myself to call their 'customer care' team.
How can theu cut me off for £40 worth of calls last year and then let this get to £542 and i dkdnt even know as its apparently taken 24 hours for the usage to update on my account. How is this useful to anyone? And why have an upper limit of £25 on my account when clearly that is of no use at all.
I cant pay this. Im so so upset.
Please help..... xx

Browntoa

That's a hell of a lot of data ! Are you watching anything like sky go or bbc Iplayer ?

Have you been to jersey or Guernsey ? Or the borders between Northern Ireland and the Republic and unwittingly roamed ?

natashasj

It is a hell of a lot of data!! First and last time i lend my phone to my son to watch youtube.
My point is that its taken 3 days for my account to update with data usage. The message i got this morning says as pf friday night i had like 600meg left. And when i checked the apo Saturday morning it said the samr thing.
I have a £25 limit on the account which when i hit it its ment to suspend the service. However i have been hit with this charge. And onlycut off when it got to £500!

natashasj

And sorry i forgot to add i havent even left my town!

superjaggybunnet

Streaming video eats data at a very fast rate.

Probably ran it up before the Talk Talk system could catch up anyway.

I would never stream video on my data package. Better to use WiFi.

abouda

Sorry to hear about your story with data usage charges. I lived through it in May 2015. Like you, I have a data a allowance and a £5 credit limit on my account but I still end up on day with £225.70 data usage bill. I don't understand how it happens and the explanation they (the Exec Office) give me does not make sense.
"In relation to what caused the data usage, all I can confirm to you is that it was used by apps updating in the background when you were not connected to WI-FI. You will see these charges and what caused these on you next bill which is due on or around 22 June 2015. If I could see that these charges were not valid then I would immediately agree to remove the charges, I have offered purely as a gesture of goodwill to reduce the charges by 50% by Talk talk will still have to make payment for the entire charges to the networks.You explain that you have a £5.00 usage limit on the handsets, I appreciate this and can confirm that this is in place but this does not at any time guarantee to cover Data charges when in most cases take up to 48 hours to reach the mobile provider from Vodafone. The data did not continue to run after your telephone call on the 22 May, this was not possible as the handset was suspended it was further data usage that came through the networks that increased the charges from £22.00 to £225.56"

Like you , in the past, my account was suspended when I went over by few pounds but when it comes to data usage, there is a delay and there is nothing they can do. I don't buy that because it is in contradiction with what they say everywhere, "I am in control, I can check my usage and rectify with data bundle if I needed." But when the mechanism of control is delayed, what happen then? They say it is Vodafone fault as it provide data usage data late.
From their advert, I believe that data usages are provided in "real time" otherwise you can't be in control. That is why I refuse the the settlement ( If I accept I will help them to mask the control issue) and take them to the ombudsman. I am still waiting the outcome. In the meantime I asked them to freeze the disputed amount of the bill. They accepted to do it for £200 for now. It is good for now as I have a Direct Debit and not paying by DD incurred further charges.

natashasj

Great to hear from you. Awful your having the same issue. Ive constructed a huge letter today stating the facts and that it is unfair. They have not given me the tools to manage my account. Blaming Vodafone is unacceptable i buy my services from talk talk. Im assuming i will have to go through the ombudsman. Be great if you could keep me posted on your outcome. I'll do the same xx

k3lvc

natashasj wrote: »

Great to hear from you. Awful your having the same issue. Ive constructed a huge letter today stating the facts and that it is unfair. They have not given me the tools to manage my account. Blaming Vodafone is unacceptable i buy my services from talk talk. Im assuming i will have to go through the ombudsman. Be great if you could keep me posted on your outcome. I'll do the same xx

No doubt you'll get some reduction off your bill but the reality is YOU are the tool to control your usage and YOU delegated this to YOUR SON so he could watch youtube.

If you want to avoid this in future you switch off 3G/data and connect via WiFi - job done

christaitfife

I had an issue with data usage with vodafone - to be fair through my charge was only £6 though. It turns out that there is no way they can measure your data usage accurately at the exact time of using it. You need to set a data-cap app on your phone for about 10% less than your allowance.

In terms of what you can do - try and explain the situation. At the end of the day, however, you are responsible for the data usage, you knew about the costs when you signed up. If you went to court over it I couldn't see any other result than you having to pay it (and costs). Perhaps explain the situation and explain that you are unable to afford the cost. They may (or may not) reduce the charge as a good will gesture.

PBA

christaitfife wrote: »

At the end of the day, however, you are responsible for the data usage, you knew about the costs when you signed up. If you went to court over it I couldn't see any other result than you having to pay it (and costs). Perhaps explain the situation and explain that you are unable to afford the cost. They may (or may not) reduce the charge as a good will gesture.

I see this the other way. If your provider lets you put a cap on your bills they should have to honour it. If their chosen provider complicates things then this should be their problem, not yours. I can't imagine a court would make you pay more than the max you'd agreed because of your provider's failure to stick to the cap you'd agreed.

abouda

Bad New: the ombudsman decided against me.
[FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]"TalkTalk terms and conditions state you are responsible to monitor your data usage as per its terms and conditions. We consider it is your responsibility to be aware of your terms and conditions."
I certainly would have bought this phone and the contract if I had imagined all the services such as the "dashboard" , the email/text alert are additional services. TT or any provider does not have to provide it. I thought I was buying a set of services. In that case I am wondering why they bother to provide them. I am still amazed by this response.






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