unfortunate bill

[Guest simonastro]

yep

just got this months bill from O

£195.00

uh oh

I've been using the SPV as a modem

believing I had unlimited (within reason, get a call if usage too high)

data on my £6 package

except

seems my calls have been not "GPRS data" but "data" calls

chargeable by the minute !!!!!

so I've been connecting, downloading my emails, surfing

AND LEAVING THE GODDAM THING CONNECTED FOR HOURS!!!!

obviously I have got straight onto O who are having a good old internal argument and will keep me informed.

WARNING TO YOU ALL

[Guest Monolithix [MVP]]

Did you use the basic settings as described on this site or some other ISP?

[Guest James]

killer bill mate!

[Guest adam]

Seems like they're charging you over £150 for a technicality.

But thats probably part of the new GPRS tariff, £3 per megabyte, £150 per emission of 'GPRS' from a sentence.

[Guest Big Ron - No Longer a Mem]

Just after Xmas, when the "WAP access pack" was fairly new, it was offered in two "flavours" - GPRS and CSD (what you've described as "data".) One woman signed up for the GPRS pack, as the result of having been sent a direct mailshot singing its praises. As it was "essentially unlimited access", she used WAP a LOT... on CSD, just like she always had. (In fact she had no idea that CSD and GPRS were different - "a phone's a phone, right?!") So, as she was using it on CSD - charged by the minute - and not via GPRS, the "access pack" never cut in. Her Xmas present from Prange was a £125 increase on her normal bill. I was sympathetic, but as a mere 156 techie, couldn't offer her anything over £30 without squaring it with a supervisor. SO, I clicked the "I need a supervisor" button on my screen, and waited. The supervisor's attitude was a LOT less sympathetic than mine had been. In a word: "Tough!" Nothing I could do... except put through a suggestion/comment (which I did every few days about something ot other!) saying that it was bad publicity and a problem waiting to repeat itself. Shortly thereafter, they merged GPRS and SCD WAP access into one "deal" - possibly because of my suggestion, possibly something they intended to do anyway. (You think they'd TELL a mere techie?!) Not long after that, they decoded that my services were no longer required.

Whatever... the two cases (yours and hers) seem to be covered by the same doctrine - and attitude. You may get lucky if you can show negligence. Refunding a sum of that sort requires someone to "make a stand", and say "OK, I think that, although this is kind of a grey area we have some kind of obligation to our customers. SO I'm going to put MY name on the authorisation." And shortly after that... they'll open an open-air skating rink in hell.

[Guest StoutMan]

I had a bill for £106.50 last month £62 +vat was for data calls the dick heads in the orange shop had put me on £4 per month for wap only,soon got that sorted out with 156 and they put me on the £6 package and credited me £70 this month. =:-)

[Guest simon11]

I had this problem. When I rang technical they told me to turn the modem off in the phone. This sorted it out. I had apparently been downloading from the Orange service provider which is charged by the megabyte.

[Guest Big Ron - No Longer a Mem]

"the dick heads in the orange shop had put me on £4 per month for wap only..."

When the SPV was first launched, this happened a LOT. We had people on this forum complaining that their bills were massive... and Orange stating categorically that NOBODY had been charged for "excessive use" of their £6 a month GPRS pack. My feeling at the time was that the "massive bills" were accrued during the period BEFORE Orange realised their own mistake (about not applying the SPV access pack in so many cases) and thus established a precedent - if that was the cause, you got your money back. THIS case however lives or dies on WHOSE FAULT it was that the calls were made via CSD and not via GPRS, and that's down to a setting in the phone. My feeling is, that unless it can be shown that Orange changed the settings (NOT the user) they're going to say "that's tough, you should have taken more care!" and demand the money.

[Guest simonastro]

Seems there is a whole can of worms to be opened.

CSD eh? I don't remember seeing that in the manual !

Thanks Big Ron for your unique insight!

Mono - can u post a link to the settings?

I've posted a few questions about modem use before but never seen a definitive guide.

I haven't heard a peep from O yet but will keep u updated.

[Guest Monolithix [MVP]]

Basically just using a connection that dials *99# and uses Orange GPRS. Also using the following initiation string (Control panel > modem options > HTC USB Modem > Properties > Advanced): +cgdcont=1,"IP","orangeinternet","",0,0

[Guest Big Ron - No Longer a Mem]

"Basically just using a connection that dials *99# and uses Orange GPRS..." connects you via GPRS. This is what DIDN'T happen. The question is: "Why not"? And the answer HAS to be "Because the settings were wrong" (You can't dial "*99#" and get a CSD connection that works) SO... WHY WERE THEY WRONG? Had the user been tinkering? If so... Orange is going to say "That'll teach you - where's our money?" If, on the other hand, the phone arrived with the wrong settings from the shop, there might be a good case that it's THEIR fault. At some point, someone has changed a setting - questions here are "who?" and "why?" If a 156 techie (for example) gave out incorrect information and the user changed the settings, Orange ought to provide a refund on the bill. If the user was tinkering with the settings, and changed them himself, then not only doesn;t he have a leg to stand on, but when this kind of thing happened before, Orange were less than sympathetic.

[Guest simonastro]

Is this information - which I obviously didn't have - available on Orange's SPV or GPRSdata/data services documentation or would I have had to speak to customer/technical services? Having never been interested in orange's business-based data services, I was unaware I could make a "data call" without setting up the service from the website or authorising it over the phone ( like text notification of emails, roaming or wireless fax services ). I've plugged my SPV into the cradle, modem activated, and allowed my normal dial-up connection to do its job. From what I understand now I should have created a new dialup connection using orange's settings which would have put me straight onto GPRS. I had thought that my pc would request a connection and the SPV would provide it using its own internal settings. I can see that this is incorrect but I am not a techie.

[Guest Bouger]

Hi guys,

I dont know half as much as Big Ron, (who is one of those people sadly missed in 156 - someone who cared). But i do work in the store side of things so do have some knowledge. The faults that lied with the access £4 month pack being added instead of the SPV pack - my opinion is why didnt they just tell the call centres that no Spv was to be connected without an SPV pack - is it that hard !! The amount of times i had to ensure the right pack was added when i rang a connection through was amazing. (980 asked me the other day what phone i had and i said just upgraded to a p800 - (still have my spv) she didnt know what it was - never heard of it i was gobsmacked !!) Anyway enough of whinging -

My experience in this matter

i had my spv replaced under care as it was screwed and that night my partner was away and i was trying to send him mms's of his daughter, and it wouldnt bloody work. It was totally pissing me off as i had recorded her and everything but they kept failing.

I checked the settings from what i could remember and then asked for help on here it was 1am by this point and i was knackered and thought i had missed something stupid.

Someone posted me the settings and they were right. I had been on the phone all night to 156 to no avail. (they didnt send me a settings email/sim update) just kept telling me what they should be - which i had already done. (ahhh its times like this after nearly two hours and probably speaking to half the 156 team that we miss associates like Big Ron :cry: ) They could not sus out why my mms would not work, said the phone must be faulty and there was not point in sending a settings sim update/email as it would be pointless !!!! aaahhhhhh

Finally i found somewhere else on the phone further settings which where wrong and managed to get it to work.

My point is - i couldnt send a mms because my phone would not connect to gprs.

therefore - when i upgraded to the spv i received sim updates, when i got my care replacement i didnt have sim updates and my gprs settings were wrong.

therefore it would stand to reason that the unconnected handsets received to stores are infact not set to gprs use but csd.

1. are you using a care replacement

2. maybe your sim updates did not work properly

Long story short - this might help with your case of getting your bill recalculated - if you have had a care replacement then here is your leg to stand on.

I hope that this provides a little help and i wish you all the luck with getting this sorted out.

[Guest cocobrownskin]

bugger me! so thats why my bills been over £106 a month. I knew i was texting a lot, but when orange had that offer for £6 a month i thought the sun shone out my arse. Now i want to know is how the hell doyou know if your using gprs or csd?

I stopped using my IE altogether but the bill is still high.

i still have a gprs because i didnt cancle the £6 offer. My god, i don't know what package i got when i rang 156, but the geezer helped me set up the settings for GPRs but there was no mention of csd!

[Guest one.ear]

Cant see the problem here.... it's certainly not Orange's fault if you configure the handset incorrectly, i.e. to use CSD rather than GPRS, and its quite easy to check which setting your on (Settings>Data Connections>Internet Connection).

Ben

[Guest simonastro]

I have never suggested it is Orange's fault

I'm sure they were quite happy not to notice that my

account was acting erratically and

allow me to run up 4x my usual bill.

[Guest Big Ron - No Longer a Mem]

Simple test: ring 152 (billing) and ask them "How much is my next bill going to be? Yes, I KNOW it'll include calls I haven't made yet, but if I take the battery out right after THIS call, and don't make any for the rest of the billing period.... how much would it be?" The answer you'll get is "I have NO idea." No human sets eyes on your bill until two or three days before it's mailed to you - and only THEN if the caller rings up and raises a query with it. The data simply isn't available, and billing DON'T spend their few idle moments checking bills to see if the usage pattern has changed. I spent a couple of weeks in billing (back then, everyone started in billing!) and people's usage DOES change. They start out (never having owned a mobile) on the cheapest possible tariff. The longer they own the phone... the more they use it. And rapidly, they "outgrow" their "free" minutes, and start paying for the extra calls at the going rate. And peak-time, cross-network... that's f*cking expensive. I dealt with one lady who was still on the cheapest tariff, and who was now regularly clocking up a £200+ bill, and suggested that she switched to a more appropriate tariff. (She'd got a new boyfriend, who had a Vodaphone contract, chatted with him several times a day) When I suggested that switching to an OVP O2 tariff would cost her £70 a month for the SAME pattern of calls - and that we'd owe HER minutes at the end of the month, she was gobsmacked. She just couldn't believe it - OR that I was suggesting that she paid us less money for the same deal in future. Came down to "Look, madam, I can press a button right NOW, and change the amount of your next bill from £200 to £70, assuming you use the phone about the same amount as you're doing now. SHALL I PRESS THE BUTTON? YES OR NO?!" It took a suprising length of time before she said "yes". I think she just didn't BELIEVE it.

[Guest Sculli]

Sainsburys' provide a service where you automatically pay the lowest possible price each month. They simply compare your usage to all of the available tariffs from the major operators and whatever comes in lowest - that's what you are charged. Quite clever really. I was almost tempted into it myself, but there wasn't the advantage of a good selection of handsets to choose from. However, if you're not a "handset tart" who upgrades every year to the newest gadgetry, I can't see where you can go wrong!

Sculli

[Guest RS]

Nice to know I'm not the only one who had this kind of problem.

I bought my SPV in December, from orange, from the web. Simple, they had all the details, it was an SPV upgrade for phone number xxxxx xxxxxx for user x. I have been with Orange for a few years now, never missed a payment, never had a complaint... Until the SPV.

First, GPRS would not work, on enquiring, I had to activate it (Although the web site says it's done automatically), so I did. I didn't use it much, but when I did I got a shock, I was put on the wrong package and was charged a lot more than I should have been.

So I rang to enquire, the woman on the end of the phone was polite and helpful, and very apologetic when she saw what had happened, though she could not change the bill, I was to get the charge knocked off my next bill AND I have been put on the correct package which has been extended. I think the extension is due to the problems many of us early adopters have had, reading between the lines, that was the impression I got.

Everything seems to be working fine now (Touch wood), though there were a few times when I was ready to dump Orange and the SPV, if it carries on the way it is now, I'll be happy to stay, and keep the SPV for a few years.

Now if only the alarm worked like my trusty Nokia 3210e, and the battery life was a little longer, and...

[Guest simonastro]

Right here's the update !

Chap I spoke to assured me there was a procedure that he would set in action.

I would receive phone calls telling me what discussions were taking place.

No money would be taken from my account until I had been told what the result was.

This he told me categorically.

I have heard nothing.

The money has gone from my account.

I've just spoken to billing.

There is no record of my call.

No notes. Nothing. denada!

New Chap gave me £10 goodwill. (before tax!)

Don't know what to think really.

I appreciate that I would have to pay the whole darn bill anyway

but is there a rogue janitor pretending to be a billing operator?

Why is there no record of my call? I was even called back a bit later that evening!

any thoughts?

[Guest Yu_]

Unbilled information IS available but most people don’t know how to access it and even if they do they can’t tell you what it is, that’s simply company policy. If you want your money back call your bank and ask for an indemnity then call Orange and tell them to pull there finger out. If in doubt ALWAYS can the DD with your bank.