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.

[pgn]

---

@xbow wrote:

Sounds wrong to me to so I rang o2 again & spoke to someone else. They said the same thing - that I'd get charged for MMS for any message with an emoji regardless of characters. They told me to use Whats App.

Doesn't make sense to me though as I just sent an emoji to try it out & wasn't charged.

I have been charged wrongly for this in the past so maybe staff have just been told to say this so that when mistakes are made they've covered themselves.

---

There is no charge for sending emojis (MMS/picture messages) between members of a Family group, using the O2 Your Family Bolt-on - in case this is applicable to you, @xbow

http://service.o2.co.uk/IQ/SRVS/CGI-BIN/WEBCGI.EXE?New,Kb=Companion,question=ref(User):str(Mobile),C...)

https://mymobile.o2.co.uk/family/publichome?broadwayEnv=prod

[jonsie]

Can you please check and feed this back @Marjo or @Martin-O2 ?  Two customer service people giving out the wrong information. I always send short messages with multiple emojies and have never been charged yet. The community guide by@MI5 is perfectly correct as far as I'm concerned and I will continue to point customers to it. 

[xbow]

---

@pgnwrote:

---

@xbow wrote:

Sounds wrong to me to so I rang o2 again & spoke to someone else. They said the same thing - that I'd get charged for MMS for any message with an emoji regardless of characters. They told me to use Whats App.

Doesn't make sense to me though as I just sent an emoji to try it out & wasn't charged.

I have been charged wrongly for this in the past so maybe staff have just been told to say this so that when mistakes are made they've covered themselves.

---

There is no charge for sending emojis (MMS/picture messages) between members of a Family group, using the O2 Your Family Bolt-on - in case this is applicable to you, @xbow

http://service.o2.co.uk/IQ/SRVS/CGI-BIN/WEBCGI.EXE?New,Kb=Companion,question=ref(User):str(Mobile),C...)

https://mymobile.o2.co.uk/family/publichome?broadwayEnv=prod

---

So I have to pay for a bolt on to use emojis?

Seems to me though that as others heve said emojis should free as long as the character count is adhered to.

Sometimes o2 ****** up & do charge however & so are now telling people that ALL emojis are charged as MMS in order to cover themselves for their errors.

I can't find this in writing & neither can o2 - they just say so on the phone.

[jonsie]

They can't find it because it's all ball locks!

[pgn]

---

@xbow wrote:

So I have to pay for a bolt on to use emojis?

I don't think so, @xbow - if MMS are not included in your tariff, you will have to pay - and my reasons for using the O2 My Family bolt-on are to ensure that each of us can always get in touch with any of the others, even if PAYG balance is zero.  I merely observe that MMS/picture messages are also included in that bolt-on.

Here's how it appears in my monthly bill (I am contract, but one of the PAYG phones has the bolt-on), if it helps:

[MI5]

Let's be clear on terminology here.
You DO NOT pay for sending emojis unless they take your message over 480 characters and your phone auto converts to an MMS message.
There's too much confusion on here with incorrect info from customer services.
Bolt ons are available for sending MMS messages, but they are NOT required for just sending a at the end of your normal text message

[pgn]

@MI5, Is this bit of advice at the URL below not what clarifies what constitutes an MMS?

https://www.o2.co.uk/help/account-and-billing/text-and-picture-messaging

The first I got caught by it was sending a URL in an SMS message - the eagle-eyed spotted the chatacter count suddenly shot up.  And no, the bullet list in the text refrenced above does not reference "http" as a trigger to go from standard text to MMS, which it should.

Cost for sending an MMS, inadvertently ot otherwise, when not included in your tariff or a bolt-on:

[Cleoriff]

As this is one of the first things I learnt (by being a member of this forum) I find it mind boggling that customer services give out wrong info...

Oh hang on... wait  minute.......

[MI5]

It does and also covered in the already posted community help https://community.o2.co.uk/t5/Other-Products-and-Services/Accidental-MMS-Sending-and-How-to-Avoid-it...

PS. The cost on an MMS is not in dispute - it's what triggers an MMS that has caused confusion from the poor advice given by CS.

[pgn]

@MI5 Yes, that superb guide has helped me out of a hole once a long time ago, and is perfectly accurate.

I tend to use ; ) or :0 basic smilies in my SMS, never can be sure when a graphical SMS is going to cost you 50p or more to send. 

And I certainly would not try to take O2 head-on to debate it, although if their advice differs from what we have here on the Community, that should be addressed.