Holy Mother of F*CK - €927.90 Bill!!!

Kintarō Hattori

I just logged into Meteor's website to send a text message and decided to check my bill out of curiosity - €927.90. I looked at the details and this is down as Data Useage. All the dates are for May but I was in the country and I have a data plan with them.

What's really weird is that data use seems to have occured on some days and not others. For example:

01 May - 9519 KB
03 May - 25473 KB
07 May - 4551 KB
08 May - 12499 KB
09 May - 30343 KB
14 May - 9580 KB
16 May - 6687 KB
18 May - 5080 KB
19 May - 5820 KB
20 May - 350 KB
20 May - 10271 KB
22 May - 12930 KB
23 May - 14035 KB
26 May - 32500 KB
31 May - 32530 KB

kc66

I got the same a few weeks ago. THere was a problem with something syncing in the background constantly for weeks. Went way over my 250mb plan. The final bill was much higher than what was showing online, around €1400 I think. They removed most of it anyway and were reasonable about it.

Kintarō Hattori

I just rang them there now and they waived the bill and put a charge of €50 on it. Confused I asked why and was told that I don't have an internet addon on my account. When I got the Hero several months ago I signed up to the Connect 20 plan with a 250MB monthly data addon. The lady I spoke to can't find any trace of this on her system so I'll have to go home and dig out the contract.

F*cktards. Excuse my language but I never felt so shocked in my life when I saw the bill.

Mimikyu

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Kintarō Hattori

Captain Morgan wrote: »

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Thanks Capt- I have it at home somewhere, just need to dig it out. Bloody annoying though, the shock when I saw the total was awful.

CosmicCrusader

Meteor are terrible for **** like that. It's why I stick with Pay As You Go. For topping up by €20 a month I get 250mb free internet, and if I excede that (which I never do) it only costs 99c a day.
They really need to improve their bill pay plans though, because most smart phones these have background applications that constantly connect to the internet. I get the news on mine, but I disabled it so it wouldn't use extra data.

Jarren

CONSUMERS NEED no longer worry about accidentally running up huge bills using their mobile to connect to the internet when abroad in the EU with the introduction of a cap on charges today.

The €50 cap will apply to the roaming charges imposed when a consumer connects to the internet using a smartphone or other mobile device.

Operators will also have to send users a warning when they reach 80 per cent of this limit.

The changes ordered by the European Commission should put an end to horror stories experienced by holidaying consumers who found they had run up massive bills by transferring data using their mobile.

One British student studying abroad ran up a bill of €9,000 for just one month of data roaming while a German tourist reported being charged €46,000 for downloading a TV programme while holidaying in France. Last year, one Irish holidaymaker ran up a bill of €200 when using his iPhone as a satnav in France.

With the new generation of mobile phones offering internet access, the problems with high roaming charges have multiplied, forcing the commission to act.

Operators will have to cut off the mobile internet connection once the limit has been reached, unless customers have indicated they want to continue data roaming that particular month. Subscribers will be able to choose a limit higher or lower than €50, if they so wish. The maximum wholesale prices for data roaming are also being cut, from €1 to 80 cent per megabyte.

The maximum price for making a roaming call is being cut to 39 cent per minute (excluding VAT), instead of the current 43 cent, while receiving a call will cost a maximum of 15 cent per minute (ex-VAT), instead of 19 cent.

The commission says the cost of making and receiving calls when abroad in the EU is now 73 per cent cheaper than in 2005, when the issue of excessive roaming charges was first tackled.

Receiving a voicemail message while roaming, indicating a new voicemail has arrived, is now free, but consumers will continue to be charged for listening to their messages. Prices for sending short text messages will remain at 11 cent per message.

The changes apply only within the EU, so phone users will still have to be careful about running up high bills in other countries.

Also from today, charges for a wide range of services provided by local authorities could rise.

Under a provision of the Finance Act 2010, local authorities are required to charge VAT on their services from today. The change will add 13.5 per cent to the cost of collecting household waste, 21 per cent to parking charges and 13.5 per cent to the cost of graves.

However, many local authorities are expected to absorb the increase for the time being.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/0701/1224273707935.html

I know i'ts too late OP at this stage but you can always contact them

http://www.askcomreg.ie/about_us/contact_us.26.LE.asp

or
them - http://www.consumerconnect.ie/eng/News_+_Research/Research/Survey_criticises_high_roaming_charges.html

good luck

Kintarō Hattori

Hi jarecki,

It's not to do with roaming. I have a 250MB data addon with them since I purchased my phone. Talking to the lady today she's saying I have no such addon with my account and that's where the charges have come from. They were run-up in Ireland.

According to her I don't have a data addon, but I do. I've had it since I got my phone. I now have to go home, dig out my contract, look over my previous bills and show them the facts.

They are wrong. I have the details to prove it and now the onus is on me to get this cleared/removed.

Royale with Cheese

Meteor seem pretty **** for this kind of thing. While I haven't had a problem with data, a few years ago I signed up to their €20 a month plan. Got my bill a while later and they were charging me €40 a month, they claimed the person in the shop put my plan through as a €40 a month one even though I'd signed a contract that said €20.

Took me a few months to get it sorted and never got the extra money I'd spent back.

Matt Bauer

Regrettably this is par the course with many mobile phone companies: data costs vary wildly depending on what plan you have. For example, 15 GB of data could cost as little as €14.99 or over €10,000. Pricing is arbitrary and difficult for most customers to understand, not to mention malfunctioning software could cause your phone to use data without even alerting you.

Tomk1

Matt Bauer wrote: »

Regrettably this is par the course with many mobile phone companies: data costs vary wildly depending on what plan you have. For example, 15 GB of data could cost as little as €14.99 or over €10,000. Pricing is arbitrary and difficult for most customers to understand, not to mention malfunctioning software could cause your phone to use data without even alerting you.

Imagine going into a shop to get a €10,000 top up please and a packet of peanuts.

godtabh

the 250mb package isnt included on your contract. its an add on.

I had the same issue. I got them to wave the who amount (€800+)

heebusjeebus

I had something similar with Vodafone. My bill was €10,000 before tax!
It look like the data connection was on all day and was constantly downloading at 111kbps for 24 hours. Eventually Vodafone took the fone in for tests.
Got a new fone and havnt had a problem. I've got 3G Watchdog to inform me of any excessive usage so i should not get stung again.

Roneyc

I've had a similar experience with meteor: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055954145. When i calle customer care I was told there was a e50 cap in place for data charges, roaming or not

Supercell

Meteor billing is a total nightmare, i cancelled my subscription to them because of this exact same thing. They kept giving me silly bills, cue fight on the phone, one month later the same thing again.
I have their usb internet thing now and it works great, their phone and internet offerings seem all screwed up.

Jax Teller

If you go back through ya bills online you will see the 250mb add on it

MunsterCycling

Tomk1 wrote: »

Imagine going into a shop to get a €10,000 top up please and a packet of peanuts.

They'd prob want to charge you for the nuts too!

Paparazzo

I lefe Meteor recently after a few years. OK, my own fault for not having a data plan in my bill, but just doing a few things online like checking a football score and match review and the bill at the end on the month is massive! Well, not massive, but an extra 30 or 40 quid. Happened to me twice so i left. No reason for such massive data charges.
Also, you can add on data and text plans online really easy, but can't cancel them without ringing customer care.

Kintarō Hattori

The chap I bought my phone from came into my shop on Friday and I got speaking to him. Even though I asked for a data add-on it seems I wasn't given one. It appears customary for Meteor to give you one month 250MB addon for free and when that month has expired a rep from the shop is supposed to call you and ask if you want to continue it.

I never got that call and Customer Care insisted things were screwy. Apparently the rep on the phone sent an email to the shop and will get back to me when the shop replies to her.

It's annoying. I explicitly asked for the data add-on at the point of purchase. When I checked my bill online I saw a data add-on, however I don't log in and check my bill all that often so I am at fault too. I have 3G watchdog installed and never once went over the 250MB limit.

Kintarō Hattori

I was expecting a call from Customer Care yesterday but it never came and Meteor took the money (€94) from my bank account last night. I'll give them a days grace and if I don't hear anything I'll be back onto them tomorrow.

This is so annoying.

gussieg

all the above is exactly why dealing wiht meteor leaves a bad taste in the mouth.
I have been lied to , disrespected by some a**holes who pass for customer service agents there , how they got the jobs i dont know, and had any number of arguments with them over charges and the fact that they decieded to REMOVE my free text allowance that i had signed up for in the first place.
it had been advertised as a sim-only deal no idea what it was called, signed up in carphone warehouse,
so for 25 a month it was 300 free texts,
300 free minutes
free voicemail and
free METEOR calls and texts.

and I also got put on the 40 a month tariff straight away, back then when the alarm bells started ringing i should have cancelled out of the contract.
I have never yet got the correct tarriff and it has been one headache from beginning to end. What they have overcharged me would've paid for a really nice holiday that frankly i feel i need now after all this!
Thanks for NADA , meteor.

DaithiL

MY better half had the same shock last week. €121.80 in one day for data charges, any website with flash runs the bills up goodo by the looks of things. When she rang Meteor (she had the data bundle aswell) they said something about an internet bundle?

I work with Vodafone and where we're concerned data/internet use are the same thinng? so im not sure where theyre coming from.

I was speaking to one of our tech guys the day after my girlfriend found out about hers and he told me that Meteor dont have a reduced Access Point. So youre accessing the internet constantly through an expensive access point. Where Vodafone have 'Vodafone Live' access points that minimises usage amounts, Meteor dont have this option so everything is charged at the higher rates. (Vodafone have a normal Access Point option aswell whihc is mad expensive, so if any of ye are on Vodafone make sure youre access point is set to live.vodafone.com in your settings or youll get nailed with charges!) Might be worth givin Meteor tech support a call and asking if they have a similar setting that Meteor phones can connect through.

My girlfriends bill got reduced from €335 to €200 and they told her to add a second bundle for internet aswell as the bundle for data.

She ragin! which didnt bode well for me lol.

Mimikyu

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Kintarō Hattori

Well got a call from them yesterday and apparently it'll take 2-3 weeks to sort out. In the meantime they billed me for €94 (a long way from the €25 I expected) and added the data add-on which I asked for at the time of my contract to my account.

Kid Nothing

Don't wanna start a new thread but anyone have any advice on this.

My brother just got a bill of €570 on his phone. Took me a while to work it out but the problem is he's after getting a Vodafone dongle from a friend and putting his phone sim card into it and used it in his laptop. Obviously had no data addon at all hence the ridiculous fee.

Chance of this being brought down? waived? It's a business account with 5 other phones on it, i'm hoping that threatening to pull the account is enough to make them reduce it!

globemaster1986

Kid Nothing wrote: »

Don't wanna start a new thread but anyone have any advice on this.

My brother just got a bill of €570 on his phone. Took me a while to work it out but the problem is he's after getting a Vodafone dongle from a friend and putting his phone sim card into it and used it in his laptop. Obviously had no data addon at all hence the ridiculous fee.

Chance of this being brought down? waived? It's a business account with 5 other phones on it, i'm hoping that threatening to pull the account is enough to make them reduce it!

Yes the charge is ridiculous and they will probably reduce it if he threatens to leave them but he has to take a bit of responsibility for it too! It was a bloody stupid thing to do in the first place:rolleyes:

Mimikyu

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tallus

Sorry for going a bit off topic here, but can anyone tell me if there's a similar app to 3G Watchdog for Symbian devices.
I have an N97 mini and it would be handy to be able to monitor my usage.

Padraig Mor

Going to join in here. Was billed €182+ VAT for data usage in the last billing period (to July 9th), with most of the 'cost' data being the weekend of July 3/4. As with others, they are 'only' charging me €50 + VAT for this. I wouldn't mind but I'm pretty bloody convinced that all / the majority of data I used that weekend was on my home wifi. Perhaps the only exception was some light surfing on the m.boards.ie site - which surely can't account for the 10s of MB they claim.

Making me more suspicious is the fact that I (apparently) went over my data cap (250 MB/mth) the previous month (taking that at face value but not so certain now) so was being uber-cautious this month. I just don't accept that I used that much! Bizarrely, looking at the bill, most of the one big download I did (80 MB on 30/6 for the Android 2.1 update) does not appear, or not on the date it happened anyway. Is there perhaps an issue with data usage not being logged to your account for several days?

Besides all this, I find it 'questionable' that I seem to use so much data with Meteor, yet when previously with O2 I rarely used more than 50 MB in a month, yet was likely surfing more! Time to hit the Conspiracy Theories forum.......

Amaru KGB

I just got a bill for using €75 data from meteor and they are saying that €50 was used when I was away on holiday.

I know for sure that I didn't use the internet once. I have recieved bills in the past for data for under a €1 for multiple low kb connections. It looks like they have been trying to connect to my phone but I didn't do anything about it because I wasn't going to argue over €1.

But this takes the biscuit. I have appealed the bill and still waiting on a phone call back. This will take a while so I'm going to ring again. Anybody have this happen to them or know whats my chances of appealing.

Cheers

S

Kintarō Hattori

Just got onto them after receiving another bill for €105. They've billed me incorrectly for the last 3-4 bills so I'm due back about €120 in credit. That seems far to low so I'll have to do the sums tonight and give them another call. I should be due back closer to €200 from them.