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Vodafone - most upsetting charges!

Hi All - not sure if this is the right place to post this but I need some advice regarding Vodafone's crazy charges for mobile internet.

Basically, I am subscribed to a 120MB/mth contract for ~£7.50. Unfortunately, somehow I managed to rack up about 1GB of downloads over a months period without realising! Windows update, Apple software update etc have a lot to answer for is all I can say. Now they are coming to me saying that they charge £2 per MB over 120MB - so as you can imagine thats a lot of money (ABOUT £2000 including VAT etc!!!).

I explained the situation and they have offered 25% off as a gesture of good will since I was unaware of the huge amounts of data. I'd understand being charged for my own mistake but I know it doesn't cost them that much per MB since they can offer 3GB/month for £30! So what can I do to dispute and try to get them to reduce the charges more significantly?! Or do you think it is acceptable?

Thanks for any input.
Murmur2k
 
Im afraid if you did download that much data then you have to pay for it.

Yes, data charges suck, and vodafone are not popular with me after changing my contract. But 25% off is something. Doing general computer use on a mobile contract is not recommended. And quite often they dont let you use it for computer data either, just mobile phone usage.

You could try doing an email via their site... https://online.vodafone.co.uk/dispa...pageLabel=Page_Help_ContactUs&pageID=PCU_0002

and put this - FIT135 somewhere in the body of your email.
 
I don't see that VF have done anything wrong (well except for the huge gprs charges they have - but thats not illegal). You could try writing to their customer services manager (and i'm talking normal post mail here). You'll probably still end up paying but it might be worth a shout. If you do have to pay, tell them you can't afford it and they'll have to spread it over the remainder of your contract period.
 
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Thanks for the replies - I agree that I used the data but I would have liked to have thought that having been a customer for over 4 years this was a large change in my activity. I would expect them to have a cap on charges and this is even mentioned in their Terms & Conditions. Otherwise whats to stop me racking up a £10k bill by accident albeit a stupid accident?! Also - looking at the website I see that the £7.50 deal includes 120MB, then for £1 per day for an extra 15MB. Looking at my phones log I see just over 1GB of transfer, the large charges span partially over 2 months so I should have 240MB for free, that leaves the remainder of the bandwidth to the £1 per 15MB (and then the dreaded £2 per MB). So for an extra £30 over 1 month I should get an additional 450MB right? Or am I misinterpreting the service? Please correct me if I am wrong. I signed up on an upgrade about 2-3months ago so if the deals terms changed would my service update as well?

Do you think they would be able to provide a breakdown of transfers on a day by day basis so that I can double check their calculations?

They have offered 25% off as well as paying over the duration of the contract which is pretty good considering
 
I'm supprised your account didn't have some form of credit limit on it, from what i remember o2 used to say fix your maxium bill at say £100 and to make calls after that you used to have to ring up and remove the cap, the cap ovbiously being fixed at a level inline with you credit score. I am supprised alarm bells didn't ring when your bill went over 500 or 100 or even 1500, unless your normal mobile bills are high? It might be worth asking why this wasn't done when you write to them. Yes 25% off is a nice offer but that still leaves you having to find over £1500 this month If it were me i'd be telling the family not to expect any major presents this year :)
 
Yeah tell me about it - My bills are rarely over £50 a month so it was definitely out of the ordinary, who has £2k bills anyway unless its their company paying!?
I asked about the cap and they said that they only have a small team so can't cover everyone! I am afraid to push too much with them in fear of them taking back their 25% discount offer. Do you think it might be worthwhile saying that I will early term my contract? Although I'd imagine that I'd have to do pay everything all in 1 go!
 
you'll struggle to get out of a contract early and even if you did they'd still come knocking for the money. You could try takling to your local CAB but again legally they've done nothing wrong. Good luck though !!
 
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If vodafone are watching (and they are watching forums - Ive just had my contract changed for the better because of it) it would be a very good idea to impliment an automated text system where it texts someone who goes over a set amount (say £200) of data in a short period.
 
I've just started on O2's payandgo £7.50/month for 200(ish) mb. If you get to your limit, they warn you. Vodafone might be well advised to do the same to avoid nasty surprises for their customers.

"The O2 Web Bolt On can only be used for internet browsing on your phone. A fair use policy applies and if your usage substantially exceeds that of other users, which is normally expected to be below 200MB/month, you will be charged standard rates for additional browsing. We will send you a warning text message advising you to limit your usage before this occurs and a text message to confirm when you are being charged."
 
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