unknown numbers on bill

HomeDad_2

Recieved our monthly phone bill this morning and what was normally just under £10 became a shocking £57

So glad to come across this site which helped very much on confirming my suspicions. However, I'm still confused as to how the kids managed to play the games online considering I barred sky dial up connection with the pin code

Well the plugs are now out of the sockets and will stay out regardless of skys warning of extra charges for 2 boxes

Bagger

I have something similar, except a search on ICSTIS does not reveal a company. The number is:

09041616106

This looks like a competition line which costs £1.50 per call! There is no company name to go with the number. I'm sure it is not a Sky Active number although I have my Sky box plugged it. Anyone have any ideas who the company is behind this number.

Bagger

Heinz

HomeDad wrote: »

Recieved our monthly phone bill this morning and what was normally just under £10 became a shocking £57

So glad to come across this site which helped very much on confirming my suspicions. However, I'm still confused as to how the kids managed to play the games online considering I barred sky dial up connection with the pin code

Well the plugs are now out of the sockets and will stay out regardless of skys warning of extra charges for 2 boxes

Welcome to the MSE forums HomeDad.

If by 'online games' you mean via one or other of your Sky digiboxes (as opposed to on a PC), it sounds like they've found out your PIN. If you are not happy to just change it to defeat them, can I suggest a Phoneguard on each socket?

Just unplugging the digiboxes may result in savings on the telephone bill but, if you have a reduced subscription on the second Sky box (Multiroom), Sky WILL suddenly start charging you for 2 full price subscriptions - thus (probably) negating the telephone blll savings.

Bagger

An update on the 09041616106 number. This number is for the stardoll.com website. These guys market themselves to little girls. Essentially, the girls are given online "Dolls". They then have to buy clothes, property etc for the dolls. How do they buy online stuff? They phone a 0904 number costing £1.50 a time. This I believe is devious since the kids don't need a credit card to pay and will definitely not read the small print about cost.

Anyway, I've had strong words with my daughter, so hopefully she will not be doing that again.

Bagger

sproutmagnet

Rather than unplug the phone line, why not go on to the services menu and set the parental controls to require a password when connecting to the phone line, then you can be sure that any games they are playing are free.
:money: Ask me if you want any more details on how to set this up.

Cheers
Sproutmagnet

Ticklemouse

My nephew/kids did this once - luckily I caught them before they had spent more than £5. I am with talktalk so just rang them and they have barred all those premium numbers.

If I do want to make a call to one of those numbers, i just route it via the BT line cos that means you have to dial the access code first and there is only me knows that

BexTech

The first thing we did when we had Sky installed 1st Oct 1998 was disconnect the phone line (that was remove the connection from the Sky box, it just a modem lead) - on single box installs Sky never police the connection. (If you have multi-room then all boxes must be connected to an active line).

The 2nd thing we did was went into the settings on the Sky box and set PIN required for all purchases over £0.00 and PIN required to go online.

We also changed the PIN as the PIN is default set to the last 4 digits of your first viewing card.

That way we made sure we had no nasty surprises.

IWasWondering...

When I first got Sky my son loved playing the games. The deal was he could play as many FREE ones as he wanted but no Pay to Play. To make sure he couldn't access these games I unplugged the Sky line. He's a good kid and understood why I wasn't willing to pay and I trusted him not to plug it back it (which he never did).
Only ever plug it back in if we have a problem and have to ring Sky. Then it gets unplugged again. Just to be on the safe side.
Reading this thread I am amazed at the actual cost of these calls. I never checked the actual costs, just decided I wasn't willing to pay. What a way to rake money in, as if they aren't getting enough already.
I am looking forward to when we go digital (end of 2009 for Granada?) as I am thinking I will not need Sky then. Where we are we can't get Channel 5 at the moment on terrestrial TV.

pinkmami

OMG I've just googled 09012250008 & its the sky games! I've just received my phone bill of £202!!!! Normally about £80. Definately taking every single penny of the premium rate calls out of their bank account & disconecting the sky line from the phone. It was re-installed by the SKY engineer on the 18th of Dec & the calls to this number (along with any other) started on the 19th. i could murder that SKY bloke!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Heinz

Wouldn't it be better to 'murder' whoever has been racking up the bill by using Sky games?

Or, less violently, getting them to pay?