3 mobile itemised billing charge

[shageexx]

I have just received my bill,at the bottom half of the page it says 3are going to charge you £1.00 per month for itemised billing,unless you switch to e-billing which will be free.

Now can anyone comfirm if this is a breach of terms and conditions.

[buzby]

No. You can opt out of itemised billing and they'll still send you a summary bill at no cost.

[shageexx]

I understand what your saying,but is this breach of terms,I mean would I be able to cancel my contract?

[moving on..]

I was told I could opt out of paperless billing and check my account on line.....great no £1.00 fee....but that is only an option if I pay my bill by direct debit..which i refuse to do!

Also I have never been informed of these charges...they are just in small print and wrapped up in the now £4.00 Admin charge!

Personally I cannot wait for my contract to end.

moving on

[moving on..]

... oh and I have had so many errors on my bill these last few month..if it was not for itemised billing three would have 'conned 'me out of an extra £30.00!

[BoSBoY]

i had the same printed on my bill, it did not say you could have a summary, it just said paper bill would cost £1.. i went online and switched.. no way are they getting a £1 to post me a bill i never read anyway..

[shageexx]

Well I have just managed to cancel my contract,which still had 14 months to run,over 3 charging £1.00 over itemised billing.

When you call customer services,be peristant that they are in breach of terms,I did,and the guy in India said I could cancel.

[buzby]

On my reading of it, it was the itemisation that was costing - not the bill. As shageexx points out, if this was a mandatory charge to receive any bill from the company, then that is a material change in the T&Cs, resulting in you being able to repudiate the contract.

[Jammy17]

Hi

 

I have just sent a email to Three trying to cancel my contract using this reason. Has anyone else apart from shageexx managed to cancel ?

 

 

 

On my reading of it, it was the itemisation that was costing - not the bill. As shageexx points out, if this was a mandatory charge to receive any bill from the company, then that is a material change in the T&Cs, resulting in you being able to repudiate the contract.

[Esteevee]

What if three have just (i.e. November 2008 ) started adding the charge to your bill, and they have not informed you (I found out about this charge only when I saw my bill)? Aren't they meant to give you a month's notice of any changes?

 

Another point is that if you can't access your bill online (you need one of their mobiles to register) you can no longer get itemised billing without paying for it. Isn't this an unfair practice?

 

Three customer services told me that they sent me a text message to inform me of the new charge - but I don't have a three mobile phone so I wouldn't have seen the text message (I have a broadband modem from Three, if you were wondering what the bill is for).

 

So if

(a) they have introduced a new charge for itemised billing

(b) failed to inform you about the change and applied it anyway

© won't give you any alternative means of getting the information

would it be possible to cancel your contract?

[buzby]

I donlt want to appear an apologist for Three UK, they have caused me enough problems, but in answer to your specifics;

1) Itemised billing has always been a value-added option. It is not mandatory that you receive it, and if you opt out then you don't pay. Some networks (fixed/mobile) provide it free of charge, others bill for it - and it is up to you to vote with your feet which is what consumer choice is all about.

 

You are confusing call itemisation and online billing. You can opt for an e-bill and dispense with the paper copy AND get call itemisation, but if you simply don't want this, you get the standard bill, with no itemisation and there is no additional charge.

 

As for your Broadband Service - I'm unsure why you think this doesn't support SMS texts. Click on the MESSAGES tab on your '3' control panel (the one you use to activate the broadband connection) and you can open the inbox to read any messages received, or compose messages you want to send.

 

So per your summary - they have commenced charging for itemisation, tell them to remove it and you'll be back where you were when you started. They sent me a text providing information of the charge, is I have no doubt they did the same to you but you've not been able to read it. They cannot be liable for that. The alternative means of obtaining the information - if you log into My 3, you can see all these details along with all data usage, so the final answer remains the same, you cannot cancel your contract under these circumstances. Sorry!

[Esteevee]

Thanks for the reply, Buzby. Just to clarify though, because maybe my first message was a bit vague (didn't won't to bore anyone with the fine details!): I use the 3G modem with my Apple Mac. The software supplied by Three only works on Windows PCs, not Macs, so the method you referred to (the '3' Control Panel) simply isn't offered - hence no way of reading any text messages.

 

I just find it incredibly frustrating that Three insist on sending info out by SMS when they know some customers cannot read them because they don't provide the necessary tools.

 

I can't fault the actual mobile broadband service - it works very well for me - but I find their customer service to be poor and, in this case, not very well thought out.

[buzby]

The real trouble is that - as you point out - you use an unsupported OS to access broadband. Now, that is their decision - as it was yours to persevere to get it to work. Therefore, because you've accepted those shortcomings, it is mighty unfair then to accept their lack of support for this, yet complain when you cannot receive text messages they send to advise you of changes and updates!

 

MY issue with them is that the Skypephone will only work as a BB modem on computers running Windows XP (not Vista) and for their technical support to say tough, it's not their problem they cannot support a 2 year old OS because it is too 'new' makes my blood boil.

 

There's lots of things I dislike about modern commerce - no paper trail required for DDs anymore, the sneaky evolution of unspecified amounts/unspecified dates direct debits now the standard, rather than as previously as the exception. Best yet, the fact that your signature is not required to create a binding contract, just your use of the service.

 

Sending info by SMS is small potatoes compared to that, but if this is their way of working, we either have to accept it or move to someone who works our way!

[Esteevee]

Buzby - please don't twist what I have said: I didn't actually point out that I use an unsupported OS. In fact, the Mac OS X operating system IS supported by Three (go check their website if you don't believe me). They give you the drivers to get the modem working. And support if you have problems. That makes it a supported OS in my books. But, crucially, they don't give you anything extra to access text messages. They know you can't receive their text messages. So why try sending them to customers like me that they know cannot receive them? That's my point.

 

I sympathise with your Vista problem - 2 years should be enough time to get something to work on a new OS. But isn't this a case of an unsupported OS that you should have known about before leaping in?

 

I'm not wanting to start a flame war here, but I think it is mighty unfair to penalise customers about something they can do nothing about, despite the fact that you think I got into this knowing there were problems ahead. I didn't! For a start I didn't know Three were going to change their T&Cs, or to introduce fees for something that was free. Yes, I did know that I couldn't get text messages on my Mac (to be honest, I didn't care about this). What I didn't know is that Three would resort to sending me important changes to my contract via text messages when they knew full well that I couldn't receive them. Do you understand now?

[buzby]

Not twisting - Three are very selective about WHAT they support, the Skypephone is Windows only - but not Vista (or Mac). Sure they might provide one or two products that Will work with your OS, but if it is their corporate policy to send service updates by text - and you just happen to be a user that cannot receive them, when the other 99 (or whatever) users can, expecting 3UK to make provision for this would be a nice thought - but it just isn't going to happen.

 

In much the same way my new Vista laptop doesn't work with the Skypephone, it DID work sucessfully with the previous XP machine, but I stupidly thought as a technology company, 3UK would have had updated drivers available so as not to leave me stranded.

 

I was wrong.

 

Back to your issue. You seem to thing 3UK changed their terms and conditions. They so this all the time, as do all the other networks. but your issue is with them charging for itemised billing, and tariffs are NOT part of the T&C's, and I have no idea why you think they should.

 

Three actually state in their T&Cs the they can and will make contact by phone and text message, so they've covered themselves. As for them 'knowing full well' anything - I think we've established exactly what they know... so faced with that, as consumers, we're on our own with the ultimate sanction of going elsewhere once the commitment is up.