O2 Bill

patmac

Ok, I know I am in the wrong here but I have gone 7240mb over my 10240 allowance (for which I am paying €19.99 per month) a 70% increase but my bill has jumped to €164.46 which is over 800% more. I am on direct debit but there is no way I am paying this as I feel that these overcharges were not properly explained to me when I signed up. Does anyone know if O2 are open to negotiation. I would be willing to pay the €34 I feel is due.

Pythia

Sorry but you really should have checked before you used it. The sales person can't explain every detail. When you sign the contract you are saying that you understand all the terms and conditions. They may be open to negotiation but I doubt they will agree that you should only pay 70% extra.

patmac

Pythia wrote: »

Sorry but you really should have checked before you used it. The sales person can't explain every detail. When you sign the contract you are saying that you understand all the terms and conditions. They may be open to negotiation but I doubt they will agree that you should only pay 70% extra.

I don't expect them to explain every detail but surely the one about where we will charge you a ridiculous amount of money if you over use your broadband would be important, oh wait we will keep quiet and charge obscene money when the sucker exceeds his 10gb's.

sdanseo

Your usage charge once the 10GB limit has been exceeded is 2c per MB. It's listed in the catalogue, on the website, and on the back of the agreement form.

€0.02 x 7240 = €144.80 + €19.99 = €164.79

Call customer care (1909 from any o2 phone or landline, free, 24/7) and see if they'll reduce it but they're under no obligation to. You definately won't just be paying €34 anyway :P

JohnC.

The charges for going over are hardly hidden away. Additional usage is clearly laid out in any price plans I've seen. It's hard to say you didn't know unless you didn't bother reading basic information.

Pythia

patmac wrote: »

I don't expect them to explain every detail but surely the one about where we will charge you a ridiculous amount of money if you over use your broadband would be important, oh wait we will keep quiet and charge obscene money when the sucker exceeds his 10gb's.

Did you ever bother to look?

Davy

Pat is this your first bill for this data service?

If so, you might get some kindness from o2 on this case. They have a team that deal with this, ring customer care and ask for the 'Bill shock team'.

Legally you have to understand the terms you sign up to, so you owe them the money, if they dont want to give you an offer of kindness. Good luck, let us know how you get on

Cabaal

patmac wrote: »

I don't expect them to explain every detail but surely the one about where we will charge you a ridiculous amount of money if you over use your broadband would be important, oh wait we will keep quiet and charge obscene money when the sucker exceeds his 10gb's.

It is important thats why its in the Terms & Conditions which you agreed to, by agreeing to them you agreed that you read and understood them. If you didn't read them then you shouldn't have agreed to them....thats common sense.

O2 don't hide these prices its all outlined in the T&C's and on their website.

How easy is it to see this info?
well goto http://www.o2online.ie/o2/shop/broadband/

Click FAQ on right hand side and you'll see
What happens if I go over my usage limit?

This displays

Bill pay customers:
Sometimes you just need that little bit extra. If you are on any of our O2 Broadband Clear price plans and you’ve gone over your usage limit, you can continue browsing at an extra 2c per MB of usage. If you’re on our older plans i.e. ‘Broadband on the Move’ or ‘Broadband out and about’ and go over your usage limit then we’ll apply the fair usage policy.

Prepay customers:
When your broadband pass has expired, you will be given the option to choose another pass or continue browsing at 2c per MB for the rest of your session. This is really handy if you just want to stay online for another few minutes.

Obviously you didn't need that little bit more you needed 7GB more, did you not think that was excessive to go past your 10GB cap?

Alternatively, goto http://www.o2online.ie/o2/legal/,Select Broadband and select the T&C's for your package.

If you approach O2 in a very nice manner with a logical argument they may lower the bill but expecting to just pay 34e is unreasonable on your part given your the one that went past the cap.

91011

O2 last week reported NET profits of over €200 MILLION in Ireland on a turnover of just over €800million.

Now you know why.

Way over priced & Ridiculous net profit margins of over 25% (and see the threads complaining about tesco making 7%!!!)

thecommander

91011 wrote: »

O2 last week reported NET profits of over €200 MILLION in Ireland on a turnover of just over €800million.

Now you know why.

Way over priced & Ridiculous net profit margins of over 25% (and see the threads complaining about tesco making 7%!!!)

That may be so, but it doesn't take away from the fact that he didn't read the t&cs.

thundercatho

Got Burnt myself recenty - just bit the bullet as it was my fault.... You might want to look into a longer contract(18Month), im upto 15GB limit for the 19.99... Might be cheaper in the long run...

patmac

Thanks for the replies, I read the terms and conditions but had no way of knowing what my usage was and still think that if 10gb is €19.90 how come an extra 7gb comes to €144, rather than mentioning €0.2 per mb why not explain that for every gb you use over 10 will cost you €20 I think the overcharge is exorbitant, anyway I will ring them later and let you know how I get on.

patmac

Well I rang their Customer Service and said that I couldn't pay the bill so they agree to half it so thanks for the advice.
Still a rip off though.

jor el

patmac wrote: »

Still a rip off though.

Not really. The price of data in a bundle is heavily subsidised, where as the price of data outside that bundle is not. It's not a rip-off when the charges are in line with what you actually used. It's just expensive to move data across a mobile network.

krudler

patmac wrote: »

Thanks for the replies, I read the terms and conditions but had no way of knowing what my usage was and still think that if 10gb is €19.90 how come an extra 7gb comes to €144, rather than mentioning €0.2 per mb why not explain that for every gb you use over 10 will cost you €20 I think the overcharge is exorbitant, anyway I will ring them later and let you know how I get on.

Aside from checking it on o2.ie, the data counter on the modem, or ringing customer care and asking.

I do agree the charges for overuse are ridiculous though.

deadduck

the overuse charges are a complete rip-off, and in the states they've finally woken up to the smell of common sense, hence:

http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/13/fcc-set-to-approve-rules-compelling-carriers-to-alert-you-when-y/

now tell me one good reason why irish mobile operators don't do this.

€€€€€ - that's why!

jor el

A warning system for when you approach/reach/go over your allowance is a good idea, and should be implemented by all operators, but it will not change the price of data. There is no mention in that article of the data charges being changed, so there is no difference in the US compared to here. As I've said many times, the cost of data outside your bundle is not a rip-off just because it is expensive. The cost of data in a bundle is heavily discounted, and subsidised by the network. No such subsidy is applied when you go over your allowance.

If people would just understand what it is they've bought, and take 2 minutes to read the charges, then the warning system wouldn't even be needed. If you want to use 20GB on a 10GB pack, then you need to understand that there will be charges for the excess. Assuming that the additional 10GB will be at the same rate, before checking it out, is both stupid and ignorant.

If you had a mobile phone and your monthly bill included 100 minutes, what would happen if you decided to use your phone for say 6 hours? Will they charge the same per minute rate for the calls that go outside the first 100 minutes? No, they won't, and everyone knows that. So why do people expect that data charges would somehow not follow the same rules?

To put it in context, if you were to use 7240MB of data on a mobile phone network as voice data (which could easily be €3 per MB), the cost would be somewhere around €22,000, not €164. 7240MB would equate to 1340 hours of voice, or 80 thousand minutes. Is it right that one person use the equivalent of that many voice minutes on the mobile network, and not pay a penalty for it? Incidentally, the cost to the operator for supplying Internet data to the customer is substantially more expensive than the cost of on-network mobile phone calls, making the charge for excess Internet data usage even more reasonable again.

Just because something costs a lot, doesn't mean it's a rip-off or excessive. In Ireland, the data charges are actually quite low. In the UK, £15 will get you 2GB, and the excess is charged at 15p per MB, 10 times higher than the Irish charges.

sdanseo

Did you know that if you were to send text data, the same type of data as in an SMS, to the tune of 1MB at the same rate it's charged to send a text...it'd cost well over €800.

160bytes in a text.
1,024 B = ~6.4 texts
6.4x1,024B = 1MB (6553 standard texts) x 0.13c
=€851.97

Data is expensive, but you gotta admit ALL mobile networks overcharge viciously.

JJayoo

My housemate ran up a 300euro bill on o2 mobile broadband, she rang them and they halfed it.

The guy i work with ran up 13000:eek: euro bill on meteor, he rang them bla bla knocked it doen to 125euro.

So it seems to be a good idea to ring them and b1tch at them