Ben
31st October 2007, 04:26 PM
Well, this is the Customer Experiences section for Vodafone so, yet again, I'm going to share another of my experiences with all of you lovely people.
My business bill dropped through the office letterbox this morning. I still hadn't been charged for my usage when I popped over to Spain the other month, so I was expecting it to finally hit. Not quite as hard as it did, though.
A little background. Before I set off for my 6 days in Spain a couple of months ago I rang Vodafone's 'Business Teams' to check roaming was enabled and confirm pricing. I was told in no uncertain terms that on my Mobile Broadband tariff it would cost £8.50+VAT a day. There's a FUP of 50MB. So, for my 6 days access it'd cost just £51.00, a more than acceptable figure for business.
While in Spain the experience was fantastic. The rock solid HSDPA connection was fast in terms of latency and bandwidth and, via my VPN, it really was a 'work from work'.
My bill, then, comprises of the following:
Mobile Broadband £25 x2 (I only took one account with me)
Usage charges £1397.43
+VAT
What I was expecting was:
Mobile Broadband £25 x2
Usage charges £51 (£8.50x6)
+VAT
I called Vodafone knowing that some serious mistakes had been made. I feared that I hadn't been given the 'full picture' on the pricing before I left, but knew that the figure Vodafone had arrived at was impossible.
The Vodafone agent was helpful. He didn't really talk me through the charges in a way I could understand, but was liaising with a supervisor.
Vodafone identified that actually, for reasons I don't understand, I had been charged for every megabyte. So, a quick recalculation and they had my bill down by £600 or so. "Ok... but that's still not right" was my response.
Further investigation found that I'd used just over 300MB in Spain. At 50MB/day that'd be about right. However, that's not how things had worked out.
As the sessions are per-24 hours, I'd actually only qualified for four £8.50 sessions. That left over 100MB of data that I had been charged for, automatically, in a 'capped' fashion rather than a 'FUP' one.
The agent emphasised with the fact that I didn't know this and after another recalculation my bill was £337. "Ok... but that's still not right".
I said that I was prepared to pay £101+VAT, that's my 6 days at £8.50 covering the 300MB and my line rentals.
A few more calculations later and the total came back as £50+VAT, basically removing all of the Spain charges including the daily fee. I acknowledged that if I were to use the tariff abroad again in future I would be held to a strict 50MB/24h policy with immediate charges should I go over (we can argue whether that's a FUP or not later, boys and girls), and we were agreed. That's assuming, of course, that they'd actually charge correctly for the £8.50 sessions - they didn't even manage to do that!
So, I'm happy now, essentially having had Spain for free in exchange for 20 minutes of stress.
This is just another example of how the UK's most robust (IMHO) and trusted (by businesses) network has fallen down on billing. Vodafone absolutely suck at billing. Every time they implement a new advanced billing scheme, like STC or Free Weekends, something goes wrong and customers are charged incorrectly. I have to commend Vodafone on their excellent CS, despite the experience being a little confusing, though I hate to think how much somebody would have paid if they didn't stand their ground and have the same (semi-)technical understanding as I do.
Taking your Vodafone Mobile Broadband contract abroad? Expecting to pay £8.50 a day? Take my advice: Call Vodafone before you go abroad. Get them to tell you all of the charges and note your account. Take the agents name. Whenever you connect while abroad, make a note of the time and be extremely careful that you do not use in excess of 50MB in 24 hours. I strongly recommend noting down the dates and times when you connect, you'll probably need to call CS on your return to straighten out your bill!
I think I'm going to hit the staff room with a bottle of Kalms. Thanks for reading!
My business bill dropped through the office letterbox this morning. I still hadn't been charged for my usage when I popped over to Spain the other month, so I was expecting it to finally hit. Not quite as hard as it did, though.
A little background. Before I set off for my 6 days in Spain a couple of months ago I rang Vodafone's 'Business Teams' to check roaming was enabled and confirm pricing. I was told in no uncertain terms that on my Mobile Broadband tariff it would cost £8.50+VAT a day. There's a FUP of 50MB. So, for my 6 days access it'd cost just £51.00, a more than acceptable figure for business.
While in Spain the experience was fantastic. The rock solid HSDPA connection was fast in terms of latency and bandwidth and, via my VPN, it really was a 'work from work'.
My bill, then, comprises of the following:
Mobile Broadband £25 x2 (I only took one account with me)
Usage charges £1397.43
+VAT
What I was expecting was:
Mobile Broadband £25 x2
Usage charges £51 (£8.50x6)
+VAT
I called Vodafone knowing that some serious mistakes had been made. I feared that I hadn't been given the 'full picture' on the pricing before I left, but knew that the figure Vodafone had arrived at was impossible.
The Vodafone agent was helpful. He didn't really talk me through the charges in a way I could understand, but was liaising with a supervisor.
Vodafone identified that actually, for reasons I don't understand, I had been charged for every megabyte. So, a quick recalculation and they had my bill down by £600 or so. "Ok... but that's still not right" was my response.
Further investigation found that I'd used just over 300MB in Spain. At 50MB/day that'd be about right. However, that's not how things had worked out.
As the sessions are per-24 hours, I'd actually only qualified for four £8.50 sessions. That left over 100MB of data that I had been charged for, automatically, in a 'capped' fashion rather than a 'FUP' one.
The agent emphasised with the fact that I didn't know this and after another recalculation my bill was £337. "Ok... but that's still not right".
I said that I was prepared to pay £101+VAT, that's my 6 days at £8.50 covering the 300MB and my line rentals.
A few more calculations later and the total came back as £50+VAT, basically removing all of the Spain charges including the daily fee. I acknowledged that if I were to use the tariff abroad again in future I would be held to a strict 50MB/24h policy with immediate charges should I go over (we can argue whether that's a FUP or not later, boys and girls), and we were agreed. That's assuming, of course, that they'd actually charge correctly for the £8.50 sessions - they didn't even manage to do that!
So, I'm happy now, essentially having had Spain for free in exchange for 20 minutes of stress.
This is just another example of how the UK's most robust (IMHO) and trusted (by businesses) network has fallen down on billing. Vodafone absolutely suck at billing. Every time they implement a new advanced billing scheme, like STC or Free Weekends, something goes wrong and customers are charged incorrectly. I have to commend Vodafone on their excellent CS, despite the experience being a little confusing, though I hate to think how much somebody would have paid if they didn't stand their ground and have the same (semi-)technical understanding as I do.
Taking your Vodafone Mobile Broadband contract abroad? Expecting to pay £8.50 a day? Take my advice: Call Vodafone before you go abroad. Get them to tell you all of the charges and note your account. Take the agents name. Whenever you connect while abroad, make a note of the time and be extremely careful that you do not use in excess of 50MB in 24 hours. I strongly recommend noting down the dates and times when you connect, you'll probably need to call CS on your return to straighten out your bill!
I think I'm going to hit the staff room with a bottle of Kalms. Thanks for reading!