Charges when abroad

[MarKin]

I have been abroad for a month. I had turned roaming off on my phone and most of the time my phone itself was turned off as well as I do not have a special tariff for when abroad. I didn’t maka a single call and sent no messages. I have now checked my bill which is enormous and have discovered that I have been billed for about hundred and fifty messages mostly to the following number 07802000332 and a few to another 4 digit number as I was travelling back to the UK yesterday. I have no idea what these numbers are and of course there are no sent messages on the phone itself. 

Has anyone else had this experience or know anything about the above number?

[MI5 · Accepted solution]

@MarKin 

If you message O2 on Facebook (https://o2uk.co/O2CFB) , Twitter (https://o2uk.co/O2CTW) or Instagram (https://o2uk.co/O2CIG) , they should be able to help you with this.

[MarKin]

Thank you for your reply. I have now sent a message to O2 via Facebook, so we will see what happens.

[MI5]

Good luck

[MarKin]

Unfortunately no joy from O2. They say that "We can see that 123 texts were sent when roaming (roaming was turned off) and connected to a network in (my home country).  You have also been charged for a further 38 texts that were sent after this bill was produced.... This means the usage and the charges are valid and correct.

[MI5]

@MarKin 

Unfortunately typical these days.

Customer service is not what it used to be.

As a side, having roaming off only relates to data and does not effect calls and texts.

If you're not happy with the response you got, you can make a complaint.

https://www.o2.co.uk/how-to-complain

[MarKin]

Thanks for the link to make a complaint. I have just discovered that in November, when I was in this country, about 32 texts were sent from my phone to another obscure number. It is a bit worrying that someone seems to have free access to send texts from my phone. I don't get the impression that O2 is very keen to help so now I am considering changing provider. 

[LittleGuru]

Did you ever figure out what was it? I took a contract last september and regretting it so much. I travel a lot and am continously being charged for text messages whenever the phone switches off or connects to the network. Absolute shambles from O2 and their customer service as they have no clue at all what are the charges for.

From my research, if you are using an iphone, these charges are related to iphone activation as the phone sends something in the background if the data is switched off (Facetime activation etc. Even if facetime is off, some sms is still sent in the background). 

Absolutely hate this network as they cannot clarify the charges or how to stop them and continously charging for something which we have not used. Appauling network and will never recommend it to anyone!!!

On top of that, Customer Services representative are 12 years old who are acting postbox and reading the scripts "These is message centre number in case we cannot identify the receipt, this number appears"

Best is to avoid this network all together unless they take these charges off or make it absolutely clear in their tarrif.

[LeavingOTwo]

I've had exactly the same experience. My bill shows data usage when I was abroad and O2 customer service have now stopped replying to me.

There is even meant to be a cap to data spend when abroad... even if I had used the data myself, the charges should have been capped accordingly, but they were not. Again, no response from O2.

I think switching to another provider is the only option.

[madasaf1sh]

@LeavingOTwo 

The cap only applies to EU Countries and not Non EU.. 

Most of the time its an app like iMessage calling home as it actually uses SMS, or an app that has permission to ignore the data roaming settings such as WhatsApp

All networks will bill for roaming data if it is passed to them by the partner network 

See details here on how to cancel Guide: Cancelling Your Contract