topic Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill. in Discussions & Feedback

Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 12:23:43 GMT

Hi All.

I'm looking for a collaboration on this topic.

@Marjo noticed a thread HERE and she suggested the Forum might benefit from a guide on ways to limit expenditure which hopefully will avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

I thought I would start with a few and look forward to anyone adding and discussing other ways/methods.

* Spend Caps. (only applicable if you have taken out a contract since Oct 1st) Link Here: Spend Cap

* Other Numbers and Charges. Link Here: Other Numbers And Charges

Going over your monthly allowances for of texts and minutes is the most common reason for a high bill

Making calls, sending texts or using data outside of our Europe Zone

Using your phone to make a purchase, such as buying wifi on train

Making calls to non-geographical or premium rate phone number

Calling a directory enquiry service.

Sending texts to premium rate services, such as voting in a TV competition

(You can contact customer services and ask them to place a Premium Bar on your account. This will stop calls to premium rate numbers, 090, 070 etc).

* Sending SMS which convert to MMS. (Link Here) Avoid sending MMS

An emoticon/emoji is a smiley face, a thumbs up a heart or any other tiny picture that many people like to add to their SMS messages.

THESE ARE THE BIGGEST SINGLE SOURCE OF ACCIDENTAL MMS SENDING.

Adding an emoticon by itself won’t, in many cases, force the message into MMS format, but, what it will do, is eat up your character count.

A simple smiley face or wink will use 90 characters.

With this in mind it is easy to see how just by adding 3 emoticons actually reduces your character count to only 210 letters (that’s not much!)

You can avoid this by inserting a smiley using keyboard characters rather than hitting the emoticon key and choosing a picture. A smile can be written as : ) or a wink as ; )

* Restrict use of Charge to Mobile Link Here: Charge To Mobile

You can contact customer services and ask them to Bar all Direct to Bill Debits on your account.

(only problem with this, you will need to contact them again to lift the bar, if you wish to purchase anything)

* Don't click on any links on FB etc.

You could find yourself directed to a Payforit scam where you will be charged monthly for services you neither want or need. More info here: Premium Rate Scams

* Use Wifi instead of Mobile Data (where possible)

* Use Free Apps instead of those you purchase.

That's all I can think of now. If anyone else can add anything, then feel free to do so. This is a 'document in progress'

Thanks also to @MI5 and @adamtemp64 for use of your work re MMS and Premium rate numbers

Look forward to hearing of other ways to limit spending, or avoiding unexpected charges.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Anonymous — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 12:07:28 GMT

Well done & a nicely written helpful piece of information

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

jonsie — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 12:19:49 GMT

Very helpful @Cleoriff and I'm sure members will find the spend caps and accidental sending of mms helpful.

Just onee point, whilst a single emoji will count as anything around 90 characters, each subsequent emoji will count as 1 to 3 characters. I don't know why this is but it is always useful to have character count showing when composing a text. This can be done within the message settings.

Some phones also have an option to warn when a text converts (usually 480 characters or spaces) to mms. Check your message settings to see if this is an option.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 12:32:35 GMT

@jonsie

Good point about the phone warning you when your SMS converts to MMS.

Mine (Samsung) always throws out this warning

As for the character count re emojis etc. That section was a copy and paste from the existing guide here

https://community.o2.co.uk/t5/How-to-Guides/Accidental-MMS-Sending-and-How-to-Avoid-it/ba-p/1014132

So if that needs changing, then the author of the guide should do it?

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

jonsie — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 12:50:33 GMT

@Cleoriff wrote:
......
As for the character count re emojis etc. That section was a copy and paste from the existing guide here
https://community.o2.co.uk/t5/How-to-Guides/Accidental-MMS-Sending-and-How-to-Avoid-it/ba-p/1014132
So if that needs changing, then the author of the guide should do it?

Yes it should be made clearer. You can check by inserting a number of emojis in a text.....

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Bambino — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 14:02:11 GMT

Good tips @Cleoriff. A subsection of the use of WiFi and free apps should maybe include WhatsApp for use when you can't use your allowances, if available.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 14:14:51 GMT

@Bambino wrote:
Good tips @Cleoriff. A subsection of the use of WiFi and free apps should maybe include WhatsApp for use when you can't use your allowances, if available.

Good point @Bambino

I'll include that in the revamped article.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 14:46:01 GMT

Just thought of a couple more things...

Calling Abroad from the UK (charged at International rates Calling Abroad From UK

(unless you have the International Bolt On) International Bolt On

Checking Travel Rates Abroad. To include links to Travel in the EU, O2 Travel, O2 Travel Inclusive, International Travel Rates.

A lot of people are shocked at their bill if they don't understand these before they travel abroad

Just a thought...

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

TallTrees — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 14:46:31 GMT

Thank you very much @Cleoriff for taking the time to help customers, especially new customers, avoid those poss scam and extra charges. I will find the completed article very important and will make a note of it.

Best wishes Cleo

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

jonsie — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 14:50:11 GMT

Or buy payand go

So much you can put in there but it could make other guides obsolete. Too many links could confuse?

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 15:03:29 GMT

I agree @jonsie. The more I think of it ....the more it becomes never ending.

That was never the plan, so I will stop overthinking it now (and go for a siesta)

It's also important to note that @Marjo has to cast her eyes over it... before anything is finalised)

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Glory1 — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 17:32:44 GMT

Looking good @Cleoriff. Just two points which should be added when mentioning Whatsapp, if you want to send a message to include emoticons, photos, video etc it's free and that the recipient must also have Whatsapp on their phone. Other than that I think you've got it covered 👍

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 18:10:51 GMT

Thanks @Glory1

The same can be said for Messenger, which is something I use a lot over WiFi.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

pgn — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 18:27:02 GMT

Great idea, this one, @Cleoriff!

Another one that catches people out: the month that you upgrade, the partial cost of old tariff and then the new one can result in a higher-than-normal first bill.

It does settle down from month 2 onwards, though.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

pgn — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 18:33:15 GMT

@Cleoriff wrote:
Hi All.
I'm looking for a collaboration on this topic.

* Spend Caps. (only applicable if you have taken out a contract since Oct 1st) Link Here: Spend Cap

The Spend Cap link is broken, as it is also in @MI5's original, @Cleoriff.

This link works tho:

https://www.o2.co.uk/help/account-and-billing/spend-cap

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 18:55:01 GMT

@pgn wrote:
@Cleoriff wrote:
Hi All.
I'm looking for a collaboration on this topic.

* Spend Caps. (only applicable if you have taken out a contract since Oct 1st) Link Here: Spend Cap
The Spend Cap link is broken, as it is also in @MI5's original, @Cleoriff.

This link works tho:

https://www.o2.co.uk/help/account-and-billing/spend-cap

Yes just noticed that @pgn. It did work this morning when I used it.

So will try the full link https://www.o2.co.uk/business/support/billing/spend-cap and then will shorten it

Spend caps and try again.

Edit :and they both work again...

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 18:59:25 GMT

@pgn wrote:
Great idea, this one, @Cleoriff!

Another one that catches people out: the month that you upgrade, the partial cost of old tariff and then the new one can result in a higher-than-normal first bill.

It does settle down from month 2 onwards, though.
Yes another good one @pgn (though not sure anyone could avoid that happening?)

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Glory1 — Sat, 02 Feb 2019 19:24:33 GMT

@Cleoriff wrote:
Thanks @Glory1
The same can be said for Messenger, which is something I use a lot over WiFi.

Agreed @Cleoriff. Personally, I no longer use SMS for any messages. But, of course, not everyone has a smartphone, some people still cling to their old mobiles.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

Cleoriff — Sun, 03 Feb 2019 08:36:02 GMT

I just want to say thank you to everyone who has contributed to the thread or just generally supported it.

I tend to feel anything like this works better with a collaborative input from fellow members.

Feel free to add anything else you may feel useful today. Marjo will be checking it tomorrow and I will make any amendments she feels necessary. Then we should be good to go.

Re: Tips to avoid unexpected charges on your bill.

pgn — Sun, 03 Feb 2019 09:14:29 GMT

Oh, and the dreaded RPI deserves a mention - not much, but it can nudge you up in April and each month after that, noticeably if you are on a top-end tariff, @Cleoriff.

No page of its own, but covered here:

https://www.o2.co.uk/prices