For those that don't know, Srsly got hit with a $550 roaming bill from TMobile, unaware at the time that the charges were racking up.
They are only agreeing to remove half.
For those that don't know, Srsly got hit with a $550 roaming bill from TMobile, unaware at the time that the charges were racking up.
They are only agreeing to remove half.
They need a call from Alvin Finklestein.Originally Posted by Dan Druff
Yes, definitely call in.
For those that don't know, Srsly got hit with a $550 data roaming bill from TMobile, unaware at the time that the charges were racking up.
They are only agreeing to remove half.
That happened to me with my very 1st cell phone when I didn't even know what roaming was. Fortunately AT&T waived the charges when I asked them if there was a "roaming included" plan I could switch to so this would not happen again. That is the 1st question I ask now when contemplating a new plan. Expensive lesson Srsly--Sorry Man.
That happened to me when i went to vegas last may, except it was $1200. The company was BELL one of the biggest in canada and they did the exact same thing (removed half). Then i payed up, wtf else was i suppose to do.Yes, definitely call in.
For those that don't know, Srsly got hit with a $550 data roaming bill from TMobile, unaware at the time that the charges were racking up.
They are only agreeing to remove half.
Was that when SS was out of country? In 2014 people should really understand roaming fees.That happened to me when i went to vegas last may, except it was $1200. The company was BELL one of the biggest in canada and they did the exact same thing (removed half). Then i payed up, wtf else was i suppose to do.
If you leave the country, get a pay per day, pay as you go or pay for a whole month type plan with a local carrier.
I have little respect for cell/internet/tv companies as a whole, but this is one area where I think people just need to really understand roaming (very similar how many people don't understand when calls are long distance/aren't on their cell phones)
I took an international phone to Nepal a while back. It was expensive, something like 50 cents a minute, but no monthly fee. I didn't have to use it, because you could walk into a little market and make international calls for next to nothing. I think 50 cents bought an hour of talk time, go figure! (Little old phone had a taxi meter on it and everything.)
So I guess I thought it was data roaming, but Srsly corrected me on Twitter.
He says that he made "Wifi Calls" (something available through T-Mobile apparently) but it was billed as if they were regular cell tower calls, at $3.95 per minute.
I am not familiar with TMobile over the past 10 years or so. Can someon explain how you make a T-Mobile "WiFi call", and how you make sure it differs from a regular call? That is, if you have both options, how do you make a Wifi call?
That seems to be the main issue here. He has a text message from them saying that Wifi calls would be free to the US, so if he can prove they were Wifi calls (or that his phone malfunctioned and somehow placed them incorrectly), he is legally entitled to the money being returned.
As an aside, he has already paid via auto-billing. I would suggest to everyone here, NEVER auto-pay cell phone bills, as they have a high number of mistakes, and your power is much lessened when you've already paid. Also never auto-pay cable bills, for the same reason (though not as bad).
Regarding utilities, you should really only be auto-paying low-mistake bills, such as gas, electric, trash service, water, etc.
SS's story is a bit more strange than the average roaming. Read these:
https://twitter.com/SrslySirius/status/438898912641179648
then thishttps://twitter.com/SrslySirius/status/438898912641179648
edit: druff beat me to the explanation
Not all phones are capable of WI-FI calling that would be the first place to investigate.
Here is a list of phones that can Wi-Fi call.
http://www.t-mobile.com/cell-phones/wi-fi-calling.html
Also the phone will indicate that Wi-Fi calling is enabled.
Here is a video about :45 in it shows how it has to be Enabled.
I actually have some experience with the data roaming thing (though that apparently wasn't Srsly's issue here) and having to pay half.
A number of years ago, my parents were abroad and didn't realize they had to actually turn off data roaming separately on their phone. This is when iPhones were fairly new, and there had been little public discussion of data roaming charges. My dad got a $154 charge for data roaming, and it was rising. I happened to catch it when I was looking at his bill online for a different reason.
My dad wasn't intentionally using data. This $154 racked up from his phone automatically using data to do things in the background, such as checking e-mail and whatever.
I e-mailed him and told him to immediately turn it off, which he did. However, the damage was already done.
I called AT&T, and had a long argument with the rep there. He insisted that my dad accepted the terms of service from AT&T to pay these charges, and that it was his responsibility to learn how to use the phone. I argued that it is unreasonable to expect people, especially older people, to understand every little feature on a complicated device, and that he had no warning from AT&T about the charges. This was before AT&T was texting people that roaming charges were about to start. The guy wouldn't budge for a long time, but finally offered to credit him half ($77). I continued to argue, but the guy repeatedly stuck to his guns and would not budge. My dad was on a 2-year contract near the beginning, so I had little power. I finally relented and accepted the $77. My dad was actually happy, and told me he expected my call to fail completely and was ready to pay the entire $154.
So why am I advocating Srsly fight the "pay half" thing when it was good enough for my own dad to pay?
Because this is different.
My dad actually was guilty of not turning off data roaming. AT&T did a poor job informing customers of the need to do this (in fact, they didn't), but the bottom line was that legally my dad was not going to win this one, and I was in a position of weakness, especially on a 2-year contract. Furthermore, $77 is a lot different than $275 (which Srsly is being forced to pay). It's a lot easier to accept a loss of $77 in something like this than something almost 4x that amount. Basically, "pay half" stops being fair when the number gets too big. What if Srsly's bill was $100,000 instead of $550? Would it be fair to make him pay $50,000? Obviously not, especially since the actual cost to TMobile here is a fraction of what is being billed.
In Srsly's case, I think there are only 3 possibilities:
1) The calls were Wifi calls and billed incorrectly. He is legally entitled to a full refund.
2) The calls were regular, but Srsly did everything properly to place them as Wifi. Again, since Tmobile provided the equipment, they should be responsible to give him a full refund, though this is less clear legally than in situation #1.
3) Srsly fucked up somehow and accidentally placed these calls as regular ones instead of Wifi. In this case, he needs to keep calling and make up a good story, and try to get Tmobile to come down further on the bill. Claiming that the phone was confusing or that it was too simple to make the wrong kind of call could tug at the heart strings of the wrong person (especially if he pleads poverty), and he could get a better reduction.
just for clarity, were these calls all to the continental US, or were they to others in the Bahamas? I'm assuming US, but wasn't sure.
I will also say that AT&T's customer service is worlds better than TMobile's. In fact, that one experience I described was the only one I ever "lost" with AT&T, and in every other situation I've had with them, they have relented or been overly generous.
TMobile was the opposite. Not only were their reps uncooperative, but they were downright hostile. At one point, I had a manger there actually sarcastically mocking me. I asked him, "Is this the policy of TMobile to mock its customers?", and he responded, "If they refuse to accept what we are trying to get across to them, yes."
Keep in mind that this was an awful situation where I bought an expensive new phone from them, it broke about 35 days into owning it (by itself, not from being damaged), and they would only replace it with a refurbished one. I kept arguing that I just paid a lot of money for a new one and a refurbished phone isn't the same as a new one, and they just kept insisting, "Your phone is used, so you get a used one replacing it." Three phones later (each refurbished one they sent me had various problems), they still wouldn't budge, and I finally just dealt with a shitty refurbished phone that had its screen vanish on me intermittently. The reps all treated me like I was crazy and/or a shifty asshole for daring to ask for a new phone to replace the defective new phone they sold me.
I left them as soon as my contract was up. So many people have TMobile customer service horror stories, yet somehow they haven't really been acknowledged by the general public as being terrible in this way. I guess they're good at marketing.
Don on the left and Sonny on the right.
''Jesus Sonny did you hear what that T-Mobile guy said?''
''Sure did Don. And makes you wonder where T-Mobile finds people like him to hire? Must have a special farm or something where they raise them.''
When I was with Sprint I had about $500 charges for a game I played on a phone.
I told them I am not paying for them. They told me they are removing half. I told them that I cant pay not even a cent more than my current bill cause I spend all my money on twinks.
They told me they are reducing to a third. I told them I can't pay any of the charges.
I ended up getting the bill and guess how much I had to pay?
Zero point zero. Why?
Cause I am a boss. If you would like to be as awesome as me let me know and you'll pay nothing as well.
I don't know much of anything about Tmobile, but literally every time I hear the word Tmobile it is followed with a complaint. I have yet to hear one good word from someone about this outfit and I don't understand why people are flocking to it. I understand they are doing something with buying out peoples other contracts or something, but still. Anyone that I know in my area who has had Tmobile has complained about their shitty reception etc.
Quit calling that hot piece of ass back home.
I'm referring of course to OSA.
Why those MFers wanting SrslySirius to pay half of $550 on what they have with todays technology a $2 investment is beyond belief. For the aggravation they've caused him they should be sending him a check for $550.
I have tmobile and the wifi calling is used to increase your coverage. They do say that certain plans will be charged like regular plans.
Check your plan and see what it says
Some TMobile phones (especially the blackberrys within the last couple yrs) have the ability to place calls on Wifi using the internet much like Skype. Even the infamous MagicJack has an app where you can utilize on your cellphone to make phone calls though the internet.. The trick is however these apps actually will default to your own backup data network if it has trouble with the WIFI .. I had issues once was making a call in Mexico down in Rocky Point and that happened lost my data connection through wifi and since I had my roaming turned on through Verizon (just in case) It got me but not nearly as bad since I have a small allowance for Mexico/Canada travel on our plan.
The first rule of travelling is to use a SIM that is local to whereever it is you are. You can buy them cheap with pay as you go plans.
If you don't buy a local SIM and you don't want Roaming charges then turn off your Cell radio. Lots of Apps allow you to control if the Cell radio is on or not. You can still connect via WiFi without the Cell radio on.
I don't use my internal SIM cell number. I use a 3rd party number and have it forward to my cell phone. I only ever give out my own number and not the one attached to the cell phone. That way I can have it migrate to where I am, including a land line or more often a SIP softphone. I use voip.ms to own my own number and I use a SIP softphone app on an Android phone for when I am WiFi attached. This way all long distance is on my own plan which is dirt cheap for long distance. I also use an Obi hardware device so that my home phones ring as well whenever anyone rings my number. I pay about $40 a year for my number and that includes all long distance, 911service, and all call routing, waiting, blocking, call display etc.
Lose your cell phone? No problem, get another one and login to your voip.ms account to switch where all your calls get routed. Nobody needs to change anything, you don't need to pay for and wait for a replacement SIM. Best thing is you are never held hostage by a cell provider because you only rely on them for the backbone and you can switch that without any help from them.
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