Poor old dad

Rockstar

Rockstar

My 79 yr old dad returned today from 14 days holiday in Japan. He got an iphone a bit over a year ago but doesn't use it much at home. While on his trip he decided to look up some stuff on the net each day not realising the costs of doing this overseas. He returned home today and discovered a 4k bill for accessing internet 45 times while away. :eek:

What an end to a wonderful holiday. Having been a telstra customer all his life they are considering his complaint.

What are his chances of a drastic reduction?
 
They will usually waive at least half of it right away. You can often push them to waive it all given that a mobile phone plan is not a license to unlimited credit and the ACCC is holding telcos to task on excess use bills that dwarf the monthly plan.
 
Thanks Dave, Who should he go to if they demand payment? Ombudsman? He clearly had no idea such costs would be imposed.

On a positive note he got to see the snow monkeys playing in the snow and some beautiful scenery and gardens, etc! :) Though he aint that keen on miso soup!:D
 
Im feeling for your Dad Rockstar but please dont get me wrong if Id ask it's all in the contract...isnt it?

These things get totally out of hand when the new tech meets with the not so new users and Im thinking that the telcos should be regulated in this regard to spell out LOUDLY in any contracts that could end up with such scenarios.

I hope they appeal to his obvious non comprehension of what the charges are when overseas.

Good luck.
 
My daughter, who was 19 at the time, got caught with exactly the same thing. Except her dad paid.

And as for reading the contract- I suspect that I'm in a majority who (almost) always click the button to say that I have read and accept the terms. The times that I have tried to read, there's 20 pages in fine print of gobbledygook.
 
I would certainly be pushing the "he is 79 years old" angle and a long time customer.

This is something we all could get caught up with easily. I had cabling issues at home and was overcharged over several months by more than $1K. This was because my iphone was browsing the net on my phone line at home and not via the wireless in our home. That was due to cheap cabling (split and split again rather than run properly).

I nearly went mad fighting for my money back. Lots of looooong calls, lots of arguing. But I won. And we had the dodgy cabling job redone. We had negative readings on our cable TV, regular "failed recordings" and the repair chap said the job was done the cheapest, meanest way possible and needed running again. They tried all sorts of weasel ways out of it, and I ended up probably paying $200 over my contract, but I was sick of fighting, and got most of my money back.

I threatened the Ombudsman, but ended up having it resolved. But sheesh they put up a fight.

This month my contract is up and I will change to TPG for my mobile. Optus will lose a loyal customer, and all because of their stupidity and greed.

I'd threaten them with the Ombudsman early on.
 
The Fence said:
please dont get me wrong if Id ask it's all in the contract...isnt it?
Click to expand...

I'm sure it is there mate. Ignorance is really his only excuse. The elderly who are grappling with new technologies with so many plans and options are somewhat disadvantaged - but life can be like that.
It will be interesting how telstra deal with his case.
 
Rockstar said:
I'm sure it is there mate. Ignorance is really his only excuse. The elderly who are grappling with new technologies with so many plans and options are somewhat disadvantaged - but life can be like that.
It will be interesting how telstra deal with his case.
Click to expand...

Not just the elderly. They make it as difficult as possible. Really, who reads the 48 pages and doesn't just click through? They need to be made to ensure there are basic things to watch out for. This is a huge problem, and they know it.

Eg. Optus told me I should have know that the little radiating quarter circle on my iphone meant I was using wifi whereas 3G meant I was on my phone plan. My kids know that, but I didn't. I do now.

My kids understand the difference between texts being in a green box or a blue box. I didn't but I do now.

These telcos need to issue a little card with really basic stuff on it that most of us over the age of 20 just don't know, and don't even know we need to know...
 
Ouch! In hindsight renting a pocket wifi would have cost about $200 with unlimited internet.

We just returned from Japan whilst we had international roaming, i turned the data off. You would have to be blind not to read the warning signs in bold capital letters of possible high costs when using data overseas. This is with TPG though
 
Explain to telco that the internet use costs while overseas was not informed consent; it was not made clear to him what the costs would/could be. Being older and maybe not so tech savvy, maybe he thought he was on wifi too; I know people who thought they were but their phones did auto searches for networks that were not free wifi. Threaten with ombudsman, they will likely make a "offer" in the form of a big reduction of cost. Also recapping on what some others said, fairly solid arguments relating to informed consent.
This:
"These things get totally out of hand when the new tech meets with the not so new users and Im thinking that the telcos should be regulated in this regard to spell out LOUDLY in any contracts that could end up with such scenarios."

and this
"Eg. Optus told me I should have know that the little radiating quarter circle on my iphone meant I was using wifi whereas 3G meant I was on my phone plan. My kids know that, but I didn't. I do now."
 
Tell them this-

I'm with Vodaphone and forgot to turn my global roaming off. They sent me a text the next day to let me know that I was accessing global roaming overseas and my bill was already $70.

NOW that's service (not that I'm gung ho on Vodaphone). I've had my share of problems.
 
International roaming charges in Japan on Telstra are $15.36 per MB.
If he'd bought an International roaming data pack for post paid services before leaving he would have been charged $550 for near 240 MB ($3750 value).
So perhaps he could aim for a bill reduction close to $600. If he pleads his case well enough he may succeed.
 
Not directly related but when "personal hotspot" became a function on the iPhone a few years back, I wasn't aware that my latop was using the 3G network via the hotspot rather than my home WIFI every time my phone was plugged in to it.

I stream a lot of live sports on the laptop when exercising and had no idea that I wasn't tapping into my home WIFI but rather the Optus 3G via the hotspot (I know, I know - there's a massive blue band that runs across the top of the phone but I just didn't pick up on it).

After doing this for a couple of weeks, my next bill was $900 higher.

I explained it to them - and they waived it, with the normal caveat that they wouldn't do it again.

Cheers

Jamie
 
travelbug said:
Tell them this-

I'm with Vodaphone and forgot to turn my global roaming off. They sent me a text the next day to let me know that I was accessing global roaming overseas and my bill was already $70.

NOW that's service (not that I'm gung ho on Vodaphone). I've had my share of problems.
Click to expand...

My sister over the course of a week (starting 3 weeks ago) was told "you're $78.00 over your plan". (She thought they meant $18.00 over her $60 plan). Then 2 days later they told her it was $250 over then 2 days later $500 over. She hasn't used her phone any differently this month to other months and asked them to investigate how the data is being used. They said they can't 'cos of privacy issues. She said, "Yes, my privacy issues (you idiots!), but I'm giving you permission to access my information and investigate". They're refusing so I told her firstly to put into writing that she wants them to investigate the data usage as it isn't her using it and if this fails to go to the Ombusman as she can't be expected to just pay $500 extra on their say so. It's also happened to a friend of hers. Both with Vodaphone.
 
Things are better now with usage alerts, but they can be 2 days behind. You can do a lot of damage in that two days before you have a clue you are in trouble.
 
Olly

If the usage has changed but download charges have increased there have been two changes introduced by some of the telcos which may affect this:

1. Some social media sites used to be free but are now getting charged.
2. The way in which data charges are getting measured may have been charged resulting in much larger minimums measured.

There's also been stories about a system or apps fault which leaks data.

There are apps available which let you know about your usage- each telco should have one, and there are apps which are available for multiple telcos. I'd recommend that one of these be used.

Also make sure she knows how to switch wifi on and how to know when it's switched on.
 
Thanks to all you kind Folks,

Some very useful feedback in your posts.

I have sent off a few of your comments (+ Geoff's link) to Dad to assist his appeal for a hefty reduction.

Will let you know how he goes. :)
 
Doesn't help in this case, but I do love my $49 LG Optimus Spirit, unlocked for $2 and then just buy a sim in-country.

Bugger buying on plans, being an older guy who probably has lower usage, the Aldi PAYG with 365 days of credit would probably be far more suitable.
https://www.aldimobile.com.au/plans#payg
 
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