How To Rack Up $28,000 In Roaming Without Leaving the US

pmbasehore writes "While waiting for his cruise ship to depart, a man decided to use his AT&T wireless card and Slingbox account to watch the Bears vs. Lions football game. When he got his bill, he was slammed with $28,067.31 in 'International Roaming' charges, even though he never left American soil. The bill was finally dropped to $290.65, but only after the media got involved." He might have left the soil (the story says he was already aboard the ship), but shouldn't the dock count?

Comments

Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[eldavojohn]

He might have left the soil (the story says he was already aboard the ship), but shouldn't the dock count?

Which means it is likely he was in internal waters (description here) so unless his contract had a specific clause phrasing "Internal Waters" to be a roaming area then I would assume it is no different than boating out on a lake in Kansas and not subject to roaming charges. Even $290 seems more than a bit steep & unfair.

I'd pay it and change providers but if he's upset, there's always small claims court.

Re:Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[rtfa-troll]

There's no way for your home provider to have a real time accounting of the calls that you make while roaming.

That's a bit of an overstatement. There are several ways of speeding up the information and if you use CAMEL it's possible for the home network to specify some limits in advance which gives full real time billing control. It would take a certain amount of effort, but it's not nearly impossible nowadays. How do you think prepaid subscribers get service when they go abroad? Do you think the phone company lets you rack up 28k Euro charges on your 30Euro prepaid SIM before doing reconciliation?

Re:Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't call it a poor design.

I certainly would. A cellphone should never choose a roaming cell over a local one.

The design is to connect to the tower with the best reception.

In the UK, early on in the development of digital cellphones, some users complained that their phones would pick up transmitters from France if they were near the coast (presumably the Calais transmitter was closer than the nearest one from their network).

As far as I know, this doesn't happen now. A phone won't chose a transmitter from abroad over a local one.

Re:Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is ridiculous. The roaming provider can stream slingbox to a user but they can't keep usage data up to date in near real-time? No such cap exists because it's more profitable to fuck over people than to implement it.

Re:Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[JoeMerchant]

AT&T pulled a rate-switch without notice on me - tripled, I think it was. I changed providers and told them to stick the ($45) bill wherever they like. They sent it to collections, who called me at work once, I don't think I even had to write the cease and desist order to them, they complied with my verbal demand. AT&T called me at home a couple of times and whined, I told them to show me the contract I signed (in 1988 when I got the card) that allowed them to triple my rates without notice. They sent me a notice a couple of years later (like 1998 or so by then) informing me that they can notify of rate changes on their website, all I had to do was pay my last bill to acknowledge acceptance of their terms. Needless to say.....

I had one tiny spot of trouble trying to get a CellularOne cell phone (they were about to be acquired by AT&T), they wanted a $700 deposit - I asked the in-store rep to allow me to talk to the person who came up with that, the person on the other end of the line pointed out my $45 outstanding balance with AT&T, I pointed out the hillarious disproportionality between a disputed $45 bill several years old and a $700 deposit and asked her if CellularOne wanted my business or not... they did, deposit waived.

The $45 dispute was about 6.9 years old when I went to rent a house, it made a good story for the potential landlord - yep, all that time and the only problem I have on my credit is when an asshole corporation tried to throw their weight around, would you honor a bill when the vendor tripled their rates on you without notice? They said they'd do the same thing.

Re:Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[mea37]

"The design is to connect to the tower with the best reception"

But as this story points out, there are factors other than "best reception" than can weigh into which tower is best to connect to. Looking at only one factor in a multi-dimensional problem is a poor design.

In a good design, the phone would connect to a "home network" tower with "acceptable" reception before even looking at an "international roaming / if you have to ask you can't afford it" tower.

Re:Did His Contract Specify "Internal Waters"?

[wwwillem]

I had the same battle with my provider (Rogers in Canada). Because I'm "tethering" (connecting a Nokia N770 tablet with BlueTooth to my KRZR phone) the "best" data package I can get is $10 for 10 MB, nothing bigger. However if I go over those 10MB, they charge me 3 cts per kB. Which means that the second 10MB will cost me $300.

BTW, my first night of surfing a little to maps.google (just 20 mins, nothing more) did indeed cost me $75.

But the kicker is that I can't get a bigger package, Rogers is not able or willing to put a 10MB cap on it and finally -- this is the worst part -- I can't get an status report to check how much of my quota I've used up.

This is not just rediculous, but simply "providers screwing there customers, because they can".

Could a mobile on the beach connect to a ship?

[Chrisq]

I wonder if there is any danger of this happening to anyone using a mobile near the coast?

Happens all the time.

[WiiVault]

When I used to live 5 miles from the Canadian boarder I would hear nightmare stories like this all the time. People, despite being in the US would find that their cell was roaming to a Canadian tower because it had a better signal. It was bad then, even before data. Now I can only imagine how horrible it must be.

Re:Color me paranoid

[Rich0]

Agreed. As a matter of law consumers should be able to set limits on any services they contract.

My cell phone provider offers an allowance "service" for a few bucks a month. It is crazy that you should have to pay to limit your exposure.

Consumers should be asked what their maximum monthly bill should be when they sign up for service, and they should be able to change this at any time by calling the provider. Any fee in excess of this amount would not be collectable, and it couldn't be applied to subsequent months. The phone company should give you a warning and then drop service when you hit your limit. Calls to emergency numbers like 911 would be exempt (most providers already provide free 911 access even if a phone doesn't otherwise have a plan at all).

Companies that fail to comply should be fined out the wazoo and injunctions should be placed on credit reporting agencies to withold any negative reports from the provider. There is just no excuse for billing people $30k, $300, or even $3 for a service a consumer did not ask for.

Re: $ 1200 bill from AT&T - try $3400 from Ver

[Anonymous Coward]

I had an almost identical experience with Verizon assuring me (sales rep & store manager at the physical store + Verizon servicedroid on the phone) that Canada is included in the plan I chose. The *reason* I chose that plan was to give a 2nd phone to one of my associates, so she could talk to partners in Canada. We got the phones, she started talking to folks in Canada, I checked the account weekly to make sure there are no extra chages (being a responsible customer and all that).

Next month, I get a neat little SMS stating "Your Verizon bill is ready online... balance is $ 3,479.00". Holy $%^&. Their excuse was that they had no idea those charges were accumulating, and that's why they didn't show up in my account (which I was checking weekly). OK, I understand a delay of 24-48 hours... possibly a week... but a MONTH? What are they using for billing info transmission, pack mules???

It took 17 phone calls totaling over 9 hours to sort it out & reduce it to around $ 700 (back-dating an international plan, etc.). Which I paid, and vowed to NEVER deal with Verizon again.

So, it's not only AT&T that plays merry hell with billing practices, other carriers are guilty of that too.

I would like to ask Verizon 2 rhetorical questions:

1.) What's the point of having an online account system that doesn't show international charges - not a DAY later, not a WEEK later, but only for the next billing period? I was especially amused by the "Top 10 Most Expensive Calls" feature - which was $ 0.00 every time I checked.

2.) Why would multiple people in the company LIE about a particular plan feature to a customer who explicitly states that they will definitely use the heck out of that feature? They're setting themselves up for problems.

Verizon: can you hear THIS now? Jackasses.