Orange Mobile Overseas Charges from 2014

jcarver007

Hi All,

Bit of a longshot I know but I was in Kenya in 2014 and ended up in hospital there. Whilst there I contacted Orange and asked for the best tarriff to use data with whilst in Kenya and even mentioned that I was in the country and in hospital there. I was given offered a package over the phone that said it would limit my data useage each day and all I had to do to access it was connect to the internet. The costs didnt sound exhorbitant so I accepted and was up and running.

When I got back to the UK after around a month my bill was around £2500. I quiried it at the time and it transpired that the data package I had taken up was not one available in Kenya. Hence the high costs on data. I explained this at the time and said that surely it had been missold. Orange did not budge.

I basically left it at that and thought I would ignore their letters asking for the money and have since forgotten about it. Until now when I am looking to sort my credit rating.

Can anyone suggest any options worth pursuing if there are any at all?

Thanks

jcarver007

Saw the following so there seems to have been a lot of similar issues with Orange.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/household-bills/9815527/T-Mobile-loses-test-case-on-holiday-data-charges.html

mije1983

I would say it's highly unlikely they still have the phone call recording after 4 years. Back then you may have got them to listen to it and see what you were sold but, as you ignored the issue, that option probably isn't available to you anymore.

It's going to be very hard for you to now prove you were mis-sold, so in the eyes of Orange (EE) you have failed to pay a legitimate bill and so the entry on your credit file is correct.

Of course you have nothing to lose by contacting them to see if they will do anything. Having said that, the one thing I would be concerned about is that it brings their attention to the outstanding debt so they may well then pursue you for the money.

Might be just worth hanging on another 2 years.

mobilejunkie

The only "sort" would be to pay and see it change to "settled". It will stay on your credit files for 6 years.

jcarver007

mije1983 wrote: »

I would say it's highly unlikely they still have the phone call recording after 4 years. Back then you may have got them to listen to it and see what you were sold but, as you ignored the issue, that option probably isn't available to you anymore.

It's going to be very hard for you to now prove you were mis-sold, so in the eyes of Orange (EE) you have failed to pay a legitimate bill and so the entry on your credit file is correct.

Of course you have nothing to lose by contacting them to see if they will do anything. Having said that, the one thing I would be concerned about is that it brings their attention to the outstanding debt so they may well then pursue you for the money.

Might be just worth hanging on another 2 years.

As an update, Orange had transferred it to Lowell group.
After trawling through emails it turns out I had emailed that company asking for the high charges to be looked at from Kenya and addressed. That was on 20/9/2015. They sent an auto response on same day.

So in light of that I would have a lot longer to wait. Would the Ombudsman look into this given it was so long ago?