O2 loophole/con to charge customers for sending emoji's

[Anonymous]

Did you know that emoji's are classed as pictures and each is charged at 50p.

I didn't know this until I started noticing a spike in my bill. Even though o2's terms and conditions state that the pay monthly tariff doesn't include mms it doesn't specify that emoji's are part of this charge.

So customers, beware that even when  you type a smiley face like ':-)' and it gets drawn as a picture O2 will charge you..

A while back 4 text msgs used to get converted to one picture msg but then how would o2 make money if they are offering unlimited text msgs in their tariff? Therefore, someone in their company came up with this genius idea of firstly not including mms in the tariff but the real genius is in charging for emoji's and the unsuspecting customers don't realize what they are paying for until you get told about it!!!

Sound familiar? This is exactly what happened when premium msg services started and the ill infitmed customers didn't know what was  happening to their bills until the regulations changed and customers knew how to stop premium charges!!!

Hopefully, this msg is useful to unsuspecting customers like me who don't realize unless specifically abd directly nformed about updates and changes exploiting loopholes. 

Well done, o2.

[MI5 · Accepted solution]

We are aware https://community.o2.co.uk/t5/Other-Products-and-Services/Accidental-MMS-Sending-and-How-to-Avoid-it...

[jonsie]

The 4 for 1 mms were older Simplicity tariffs. We do know about the emoji problem which is why there is a community help page.

[MI5]

Worth noting there is also a bolt on if any customers still send MMS messages.
https://www.o2.co.uk/shop/tariffs/bolt-ons/

[Cleoriff]

It's not just O2 that charge either. EE and Vodafone customers will pay for sending emoji's. This is a topic that has been discussed publicly for about 2 years now. I haven't done an extensive search but this article was published in 2014 http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/phones/2014/12/got-a-samsung-phone-you-could-get-charged-extra...

[MI5]

It's a "smartphone" thing.
There was a "Rip off Britain" programme about it recently, if you remember that too.....?

[madasaf1sh]

It all depends on how your handset sends emoji's and what character set it uses to send the smiley.

If you use any of the none standard smileys, that dont use ascii characters then you will be charged for a picture..

The SMS Centres (SMS Servers) only recognise ASCII Characters

I have sent 100's of texts this month with smileys in them, and havent been charged a single penny for sending texts...

maybe speak to your handset manufacturer and check how to switch off MMS sending.

[gindygoo]

Also whereas I used to get charged for messages becoming longer when emojis were added in (isn't that why you get charged because the text becomes very long?) now I can send a text of any length and it's included in the free unlimited text allowance.

So is it just me this has changed for?

I just turned off mms in my settings, and if a text became too long it would cut off instead of turning into an mms. That might be worth noting for the op @Anonymous that to stop this just turn off your mms in settings.

[MI5]

If you turn MMS off (as per the thread I linked to ) your phone can't convert.
It will either fail to send or send as multiple text messages.

[gindygoo]

Ah, apologies I didn't actually click the link 😳 @MI5

Still it was worth noting it I guess, just in case whoever else is reading the thread also didn't click the link 😱

#linkclickersanon