O2 GPRS Charges

[Bobbo2000]

Have had a search through this forum and can't find any info regarding this so thought I would ask for your opinions.

During Many, June and July 2006 I received some huge bills from O2 that included charges for GPRS usage (I did use this quite a bit so while shocked at the amounts I paid up). On 3rd August I received a credit from O2 for just over £900 for the full refund of these charges - this credit was received without any query from me so I assumed that they had made a mistake in the original billing. I had vowed to stop using this service but the credit had been given so I continued.

The next invoice comes in and I am again charged for GPRS so I wrote asking for a refund - they had previously refunded my usage without any explanation from them or request from myself so I assumed that they had incorrectly billed this. The response came saying that they had made the original refund as my free GPRS usage period had ended but they had not informed me that I would be charged so had issued a refund.

This response (on 27th October) marked the first communication from them stating that I would be charged for GPRS usage so I have stated that I require a refund of all GPRS charges to this date.

I have received a reply stating that they will not refund me giving the same reasons in the first letter. This week I have followed up my refund request up asking for all charges to the 27th October to be refunded as this was the first time that I had received any communication from them stating that these were to be charged. I have also said that if they do not refund them within 14 days then I will be prepared to take action to recover them.

Total refund that I have requested is just under £750 (inc VAT).

Does anyone have any experience in this? Has anyone successfully reclaimed charges? My argument is that their original correspondance stated that they had not informed me that they were to start charging me (hence the original credit) and so I require a refund for all charges prior to the date of this letter - I have accepted to pay for all charges after this.

[buzby]

The difficulty here is in having to prove you genuinely though the GPRS service would be provided at no cost, even after a whopping amount appearing on your bill and a subsequent credit. Atr the time you took out the contract, what was the offer? If it was 3 months free data, they are under no obligation to let you know when the 3 months are up. Could you expand?

[Bobbo2000]

They told me the original credit was because they had not informed me the free period was ending and that I was subsequently informed that further usage would be charged. I was not informed of this until I queried the other charges.

In this instance I do not believe that they can claim they are under no obligation to inform me (because they have admitted crediting me for usage before they officially told me the period was over).

As the first letter notifying me that this was the case was sent on 27th October I am arguing that all charges to that date should be refunded.

[Bobbo2000]

Also I should mention that I had received no charges for usage in the previous 2 years on this contract so this would indicate a change in the contract that they should have informed me about.

[buzby]

As I mentioned earlier, no judge would accept that simply because there was no communication from trhe network to you, that they were not entitled to charge for their data services. When you took up the offer, clearly there was an incentive of some sort that you were made aware of? What did they promise you at the commencement of the contract, and did they deliver it?

If so, any other waiver by them would be as goodwill, not as a right, and this would affect the success of any litigation you might wish to consider if they refused to negotiate further.

A further consideration is the vast amounts of data you were moving. Most networks have a fair use policy and this invariably peters out after 4Mb, so there could also be this hurdle that they would add fees if your use was excessive.