Work Phone bill - £2400!!!
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escapemcp
Posts: 2 Newbie
Hi there,
First time poster, long time lurker
My employer provides me with a phone and rather than carrying around 2 phones, I purchased a phone with 2 SIMS slots and used the work SIM in my personal phone. All was well for over a year, until one day I switched over to using work data (which I had done on many other occasions), but forgot to switch back. 2 months later I got an email from the boss, telling me that I had been using my phone extortionately and that there was a £280 bill. I was told to remove the SIM from my phone (which I immediately did). Then the following month there was a £1800 bill for something like 60GB of data! The delay was due to the phone company which my company used taking over a month to bill. Finally there was a £400 bill for 9GB of data, again being usage BEFORE the company had informed me to remove the SIM (talk about a slow billing cycle!)
My company want me to pay this bill (which I am totally unable to do). I had offered £80 a month to cover that first bill (as at the time this is all I thought the bill was), although now obviously things have massively changed. My company want me to get a loan to pay the bill, to which I have politely told them to sod off. They expect me to pay the whole bill, despite me never signing such an extortionate phone contract and that being over ⅛ of my pre-tax salary
Where do I stand on this please? I am planning to leave this company REAL soon, but I don't want to be working only to receive no pay.
Thanks in advance.
First time poster, long time lurker
My employer provides me with a phone and rather than carrying around 2 phones, I purchased a phone with 2 SIMS slots and used the work SIM in my personal phone. All was well for over a year, until one day I switched over to using work data (which I had done on many other occasions), but forgot to switch back. 2 months later I got an email from the boss, telling me that I had been using my phone extortionately and that there was a £280 bill. I was told to remove the SIM from my phone (which I immediately did). Then the following month there was a £1800 bill for something like 60GB of data! The delay was due to the phone company which my company used taking over a month to bill. Finally there was a £400 bill for 9GB of data, again being usage BEFORE the company had informed me to remove the SIM (talk about a slow billing cycle!)
My company want me to pay this bill (which I am totally unable to do). I had offered £80 a month to cover that first bill (as at the time this is all I thought the bill was), although now obviously things have massively changed. My company want me to get a loan to pay the bill, to which I have politely told them to sod off. They expect me to pay the whole bill, despite me never signing such an extortionate phone contract and that being over ⅛ of my pre-tax salary
Where do I stand on this please? I am planning to leave this company REAL soon, but I don't want to be working only to receive no pay.
Thanks in advance.
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Comments
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You misused company property, so I suspect they will be withholding your final pay to settle this balance.0
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Well I think you have to take a little bit of responsibility here - you decided to buy a dual sim phone so you didn't have to carry 2 phones, you forgot to switch over sims when using data and you mistakenly used the data.
Was the data used abroad as that may account for the slowness in being charged?
You may not have signed up to paying an extortionate phone bill but switch the question around - why should the company pay the bill because of your error?0 -
No, the data was not used abroad.
Some of the data was related to me working (which is why I switched it over in the first place). The phone company is unable to separate the bill as it's all internet.
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Check your employment contract, there's often a clause in there about using a work phone for personal use. You can't expect your company to pay for this one.0
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You made a mistake. You have to take responsibility for your mistake. I'd be negotiating with your employer to pay it off over a longer period and also to try to shave off some of the bill by providing evidence that you were using at on company business for at least some of the time.0
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So in one month you used 60GB of data on your phone? That's pretty high usage, surely. Does your normal data plan cover that? If not, it is going to look odd that in the month when you were using the work data, you used your phone so heavily. What would your average work-related usage be over the previous six months?0
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Ask them what your average monthly bill normally is & then ask them to deduct that from the total they want you to pay. That's what I would do (I look after the company phone bills for my company).0
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I think you'll find the general consensus is that you owe this money (though from your remarks about not signing a contract and intending to leave - you don't think you do).
It's a pretty standard term on most employment contracts that deductions can be made from your salary and also that company property is not for personal use. If I was a betting man, I'd wager a lot of money that if you was to quit without agreeing to repay the money, you would not receive a final salary. I'd wager even more that if you was to quit just after being paid you'd find yourself with a court summons.
This seriously sucks for you, I can't imagine how crushing it must be to be hit with a £2400 bill out the blue but ultimately the bill exists because of your actions and you won't be able to fob this off on someone else.
I would work with the employer to a) try to reduce it b) come to a payment arrangement.Know what you don't0 -
Is your intention to leave related to the event described?Don’t be a can’t, be a can.0
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I wouldn't pay it. I think that that kind of money for data is overly extortionate. The contract to pay the bill is between your employer and the phone network. You wouldn't have entered into a contract that charges £30 per GB, so why should you be expected to pay for the error?
Legally, the company cannot make deductions that takes you below minimum wage.0
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