Money Talk
Sue’s Guide To Mobile Phone Data Charges
If you’ve got a pay-monthly contract for your mobile phone, you’ll usually get a bundle of texts, call time and data as part of your package. Stay within your limit and all’s well, but if you run over you can incur fixed costs.
I’m with Vodafone and last month got a text on the train home saying I’d used up all my inclusive data. I stopped using my phone apart from making calls and sending texts, but was still billed for an extra £6.50.
I rang Vodafone customer service who told me my warning had been sent out too late, which meant I was already incurring charges. This meant a fixed £6.50 for 250MB of data, even though I’d apparently used just 1MB at the point of the text warning.
Vodafone did refund the £6.50 after I made a fuss, but the rules on whether mobile companies should warn you – and when – can be confusing.
Ofcom, the communications regulator, say there’s no legal requirement for mobile operators to warn customers in advance of running over their data usage if they’re in the UK. However if you’re abroad they must warn you once you reach around 80% of your data usage.
Some operators, like Vodafone, say they do issue advance warnings even in the UK. Vodafone recently changed its system – customers should now get two warning texts, and a third at the point when you have used up your data bundle.