Turns out the gypsies were a bit more keen on my phone than previously thought. My T-Mobile bill for £431.88 arrived this morning. There were 32 calls to Romania starting at 1 in the morning. Apparently, that’s enough for T-Mobile to realise that something’s not quite right.
When I had a debit card nicked from my wallet, HSBC spotted there was something wrong after three transactions totalling about £32 – which was before I’d even noticed it was gone. Yet T-Mobile apparently thought that making calls to Romania in the depths of the morning was perfectly normal behaviour on my part (my mobile bill is normally £20 a month), right up until call number 31.
So I call T-Mobile and beg for clemency. I point out that trying to get hold of T-Mobile customer services from Spain is difficult; the international operator couldn’t provide me with a number; directory enquiries 118 numbers don’t work from abroad; and I had no Internet access. And while the telesales guy “understood where I was coming from”, company policy apparently says that I’m liable for all calls until I manage to break through to T-Mobile customer services. There was no one, apparently, that I could talk to to try to persuade them this was not really very fair.
Beware T-Mobile everyone.
And don’t bother with insurance either. I’ve checked the small print on both T-Mobile’s and Orange’s policies and neither of them cover phone calls, only the cost of a replacement handset, less excess of £50 or more. I could get a pay as you go handset for that.
I think that’s interesting, don’t you? T-Mobile is effectively a willing accomplice to robbery. In the event of a theft, there’s no “is there anything we can do to help?” Instead, you’ll get “You’ve been robbed? Please pay us £431, or we’ll send the boys round.” I know of at least one person who, when they challenged this and refused to pay, was presented with a 50% increase in the amount claimed (legal costs) and letters from a debt recovery agency.
I’m going to investigate Oftel to see what their policy is on this. I’ll let you know what I found out.
The moral of this story: beware the mobile phone. In the event it’s stolen from you, there’s absolutely nothing you can do to stop yourself from being robbed blind, again and again, by the robber and the mobile phone companies.