Blackberry internet charges?!

[Anonymous]

Hello there,

I have just got my bill in and have about £5 worth of internet charges from mobile.o2.co.uk. The woman at o2 said it was from incompatible apps i have on my phone which I understand to a certain degree. But how am i meant to know what apps are free and what are not?! Has anyone else experienced this? I use my phone a lot and this is the first time I have had charges.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Ben.

[Anonymous]

There are two types of app on a Blackberry: those which are compatible with BIS and those which need to connect through your operator's 'servers' (mobile.o2.co.uk)
For this reason I recommend that Blackberry owners have a Blackberry data bolt-on and a web bolt-on or capped tariff.(like O2 web daily)
The other option is to check with the developer of each app whether it will connect through BIS and don't install those that won't.

[Anonymous]

I sympathise. I have just spent Saturday morning debating this with O2 support, to at least five separate individuals after getting cut off each time. I went through this a couple of years ago also. Back then they made a change to the billing system so that blackberry unlimited users wouldn't get stung when their phone chooses to use a different access point. This workaround seemed to function for a good 18 months or so. The problem now seems to have come back and is not commonly understood by first line support.

As a user, you just want a service. You don't want to be a TCP settings guru or to need to understand O2's back office systems. If I do make progress and can post any tips here I will.

Pete

[Anonymous]

thanks for this guys.

i spoke to o2 again and they have refunded the charges but said to be careful what apps i do/don't use. they recommended to only use blackberry apps. This just seems ludicrous to me! Unlimited should mean just that. Why should i have to be careful what i use on my phone when the contract is unlimited?!

I have read elsewhere customers have had notes added to their accounts to say all data charges will be refunded but what a carry on every month! i was told i would not be refunded again if the same happens.

[Anonymous]

I think I have now got to the bottom of this. Basically Blackberry Unlimited is not what you think it is. The default Apps of blackberry browser and push email will default to using the Blackberry.Net access point. This is included in your "unlimited" allowance and appears on your bill as such. Other Apps that you download can choose to use the WAP interface which is mobile.o2.co.uk. Opra did this to me. If you have looked through your settings and found the TCP, APN settings and have changed this to blackberry.net, this setting appears to be ignored. There is nothing you can change to stop apps accessing mobile.o2.co.uk if they want to.

I was on Simplicity 15 with the Blackberry Unlimited bolt on. If I had the O2 Unlimited web bolt on then I would not have been charged for accessing mobile.o2.co.uk. However, Simplicity 15 does not allow 2 bolt ons and you need Blackberry unlimited to receive push email, i.e. email sent to your phone. I suggested to O2 that as a good will gesture they gave me both. This proved technically infeasible as things stand and i would have to pay for the second bolt on by upgrading to achieve what I thought I was getting in the first place. Not very satisfactory considering for 18 months previous it had worked.

So, if you are in this situation you have the choice of paying for a second web bolt on or just using the default blackberry apps. What did I do? I got re-con 32gb iPhone 3gs instead. Thats another story - no java and iplayer doesn't work on 3g unless you are on Three or Vodafane contract....However all apps seem to access idata.co.uk which is part of the iphone unlimited plan...phew...

If you are reading this in the same situation its probably not worth chasing support any more. You will get conflicting views as to what unlimited includes. Some that I talked to thought that if you pay for unlimited you get unlimited. Others seemed to expect me to know which apps were accessing WAP. Neither of which helped me.

Good luck, I hope this saves you some time.

Pete

[Anonymous]

Would one possible workaround be to remove the configuration for the mobile.o2.co.uk APN from the handset?

[Anonymous]

Yeah i asked that when i was on the phone to o2....they didnt know how to do it!

[Anonymous]

No, the APN setting of mobile.o2.co.uk setting is ignored and not used. You can change it to blackberry.net if you want but it will make no difference. Some apps will still use the WAP service, i.e. mobile.o2.co.uk. I did an experiment for this and proved it to be the case.

[Anonymous]

is you folow these steps you shouldnt have issues with the browser connecting up wrong but you can still be charged for using apps.

Open Browser
Hit Options
General properties
Default browser
switch to internet browser
Press back once
when prompted hit save
Then go back to your stand by screen,
Take the battery out of the handset to force it to turn off
Put the battery back in and boot the phone back up.


o2 staff

[Anonymous]

I have followed these instructions and will repor back./ Fed up with this!