Help! 15 Y/O daughter Vs phone bill, & it's me that has lost out.

My daughter has registered to use this site, so please have a little respect/compassion if she plucks up the courage to post

This can only go well! 😉

(Don’t worry, am sure we’ll all play nicely!)

My daughter has registered to use this site, so please have a little respect/compassion if she plucks up the courage to post

Nice one. Hello Miss 2unfit2ride, hope you are suitably impressed!

Makes me smile (in a sad way) that the OP comes here asking for help, and most people offer no help whatsoever by advising punishment or apportioning blame etc etc. This doesn’t help reduce or pay the bill, it just helps stop it happening again (maybe). Just commenting like….

I suggested that he look at previous months usage to see if this was a one-off, in which case there might be some leniency. On the other hand, if it has been going on for some time and the service provider has been happy to waive the additional cost until now, his bargaining position is much weaker.

druidh – you must be one of the good guys, there’s plenty who just want to point and criticise…..

On the other hand, if it has been going on for some time and the service provider has been happy to waive the additional cost until now, his bargaining position is much weaker

I’d have thought that might make his position stronger, given tacit consent in previous months (esp if no warnings sent)

That.

Of course, it’s also the responsibility of the contract holder to check the monthly bills/usage stats.

Edit: Kudos to the OP for not going off on a rant and accepting his part in this.

Ok, just looked at the bills online, the £18 contract ranged from £18 to the last one which, I somehow missed taking her aside for, was for £50, but in fairness this is almost exactly the same amount that Virgin bill me for my TV/broadband & phone so I would of just looked at it as if that was my monthly virgin bill.

<clutching at straws> If it helps I recently, as in before any of the high bills came in, wrote to Virgin asking for all of my accounts to be pooled so I knew what was going on with my account, as keeping an eye on three accounts was just wasting my time. </clutching at straws>

I blame the parents, mainly. Still can’t understand the mentality of parents who allow kids to have contract phones. If your kids are so desperate for a phone get them a PAYG affair & let them pay for it.
But there again, maybe I’m just old fashioned.

My daughter (now 16) has had a contract phone for 3 years now. It’s never been an issue. If kids can’t handle the responsibility, then it must be down to bad parenting.

Our 12 year old daughter has had a contract phone for 18 months now – and had a PAYG for a couple of years before that.

We’ve never had an issue with it – and that with my card details being entered on her i-tunes account since she had her i-pod touch 3-4 years ago – now has an i-phone4.

Beware of Houns bearing rohypnoccinos Miss 2unfit2ride. 😉

It’s ok, she’s under 18, she’s safe

However she needs to be afraid of forky

forky only exists in a parallel universe though dunt he?

One you’ve escaped from 😡

Seems totally bizarre that something can be described as ‘unlimited’

seem to be a few comments along this line of thought, I have to ask, where have you been the last 5 years? Unlimited doesn’t actually exist anymore, it’s now in a symbiotic relationship with the parasitical entity “fair use policy”. I completely agree that it is totally ****ed up but it has been the case for quite some time now.

I doubt I’m missed Houns

Not an entirely intentional abstinence – vaguely remember getting an email saying that the other side had borked again and never bothered following it up – or maybe I imagined it and have just blanked the abuse from my memory 😐

<looks suspiciously at any new members>

Poor choice of words…

seems like a lot have been there like we have 🙁 now jag2&3 have fixed t mobile monthly contracts x mins and unlim txt has worked ok so far.
jag 1 did us over when on 02 payg used my cc to keep topping up over £100 /day one time. 02 ‘kin useless no security questions! 14 yo £10 per go i must have a really girly voice or hers was a bit butch! (have removed 3 fig code off cc’s now as precaution)so IME you may have to suck it up wouldnt expect much from phone co
good luck tho john

Houns – Member
Hey Miss 2unfit2ride
Get pregnant, your dad will soon forget about this

Hth

Ah Houns you do make me laugh sometimes.

It’s ok, she’s under 18, she’s safe

However she needs to be afraid of forky

This is all getting a bit Mleh…

Give the phone provider a ring and play merry hell. Unlimited is unlimited and if they felt it was being abused they should have informed you in writing. Not decided ‘hey-ho it’s a charging we will go’! It’s not like you have physically used anything either like apples for instance. Text messages cost nothing so how they feel they can be justified in charging £500 to a 15 year old is ridiculous.

Go straight to Ofcom and register a complaint too. You’ll be surprised at how much more notice networks take when the regulator is behind them. Phone networks make themselves look stupid when they get greedy. If you were sold unlimited SMS then even if there is a fair use policy they should have informed you of intent to charge. Not just applied the charge.

Double post- how did that happen? 🙂

Is there a chance that ‘pooling’ the accounts has caused something odd to happen with the text counting?

A few years back, my sister (probably the same age as the OPs daughter actually!) had a contract with, say 2000 texts a month. She used to use almost all of them within the first two weeks and then ration them to last through the last 2-3 weeks of the month.

One month she was eligible for an upgrade so went into the T-mobile store and switched over to a new phone. This changed the start date of her contract month.

So, previously, her contract had started on the 1st of the month, she’d used 1500 texts in one week, then had gone in and restarted the contract with a new phone, and a renewal date of the 8th. So her 2000/month text allowance was pro-rata’d down, to roughly 500 texts for a week. Which meant that she was retrospectively charged for the 1000 texts above her ‘allowance’ that had been used. Cue a bill for >£130.

It took a while before we realised how the bill had got so big. She was good at checking her balance/allowance, but when she’d used the texts they were free. it was only when she went into the store and got a new phone that she was back-charged for stuff that was free when she used it.

*is now worried about giving eldest_OAB his first phone for Christmas*

esselgruntfuttock – Member
Still can’t understand the mentality of parents who allow kids to have contract phones.

As I posted earlier it’s about security, would I want my daughter stranded somewhere late at night unable to call because she had no credit ?

We tried PAYG for a short while but it was exactly the issue above which quickly meant we moved them onto contract phones.

As I posted earlier it’s about security, would I want my daughter stranded somewhere late at night unable to call because she had no credit ?

Well they could always just reverse the charges?

As I posted earlier it’s about security, would I want my daughter stranded somewhere late at night unable to call because she had no credit ?

how did daughter’s mum survive when she was a wee lass?

how did daughter’s mum survive when she was a wee lass?

perhaps she was allowed less freedom because her parents weren’t sure she could contact them if she needed to?

I wish I had eniugh friends to talk to so much that my phone bill could be £580.

However; no one likes me; not even my family.

perhaps she was allowed less freedom because her parents weren’t sure she could contact them if she needed to?

hmm maybe. that sounds counterproductive though if you end up worrying about the imminent danger she is constantly in though.

I wish I had eniugh friends to talk to so much that my phone bill could be £580.

hang on al, I’ll text you something provocative.

perhaps she was allowed less freedom because her parents weren’t sure she could contact them if she needed to?

A fair point. I bet josef fritzl never had this problem

Daughter clocks up massive bill….. father pays the bill…. daughter learns nothing.

She should foot the bill (spread over 12 months payment back to you?), and have her phone removed.

People are too ‘paranoid’ about getting kidnapped and raped these days – thinking the phone is some essential must-have safety item you can’t possibly walk out the door without…

Take the phone away, and she’ll have to make do without. Emergency? I’m sure she can borrow a phone from someone for a call…. or use a pay phone….. or ask in a shop for a phone….. you know the score.

It’s getting nigh on impossible to find such a thing these days.

even more so a payphone that takes coins …..

girlfriends father got caught out with that , even he bought a mobile phone and carries it after a long walk back from the car garage (c 20 miles! )

Get her one of these for emergencies

😀

WHat an odd situation you find yourself in, forced between taking the phone off your daughter for missuse or feel guilty for taking it off her and “something” like and emergency happens.

Glad I don’t have kids.

But if I did I’d take the phone off her, then buy a PAYGO phone and stick £15 on it then get her to pay for it. In the meantime I’d stop all pocket money, skool trips, Xmas/Birthdays pressies and put her to work in the Mines/Mills.. Wot? Wot you can’t do that these days? Shame.
Ok, then get her a pert time job doing something to generate income so she can pay you back.

Which means you’ll have to pay the bill, and to be fair you should be monitoring the usage, not your Daughter.

I’m late to this one, simply cos’ I don’t have kids.

Been there, done this in my youth… took a pasting for it… In all honesty i’m a very easy going person and would struggle to enforce cancelling Xmas etc…

I’ve nothing usefull to add as I grew up with a PAYG phone and wasn’t the victim of some horrible tragerdy.

So, this thread is useless without pics.

hang on al, I’ll text you something provocative.

Thanks; however I’m still nowhere near.

about one every 7 mins.

24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Need more friends.

If only I wasn’t so unlikeable.