A father saw his telephone bill explode after a short stay in Andorra. His out of package reached 5400 euros after only one day in the principality, which is not part of the European Union.
Holidays are often a time to disconnect, but some people still appreciate being able to access the Internet to keep busy. This was the case of a father and his children, who were passing through Andorra for an excursion after a stay in northern Spain. His children have used their daddy’s phone to watch cartoonswithout imagining what was going to happen.
Just a few minutes after entering the territory of the Principality of Andorra, the father’s cell phone receives an alert warning him that his consumption has exceeded 50 euros. As a reminder, the abolition of roaming charges has been extended until 2032 in the European Union, which allows you to use your plan with our neighbours, but the Principality of Andorra is not one of the European countries.
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His bill explodes after just one day in Andorra
After having received the first alert of the excess of 50 euros, the connection of the father of the family is cut. The latter is therefore no longer worried about his smartphone, which nevertheless continues to consume data. After his day of excursion, the latter had the unpleasant surprise of receiving a new SMS notifying him ofconsumption outside Europe of 400 MB, and a bill now amounting to 5400 euros.
In shock, the father of the family hastens to contact his Belgian operator Telenet on his return from vacation in mid-July. “Every day I am given different information. First by being reassuring, that an amount of this magnitude is not normal and that I will be given a credit note. Later, another call center employee told me that Telenet had to call the fraud service and that it would still cost me 2600 euros. I am told to call back in several days, that nothing can be done at the same time, that there is a risk of data theft…”, he reports.
After several days of uncertainty and a mobile connection still cut, his operator finally told him that one of the customer service advisers had made a mistake by not deactivating data consumption beyond 50 euros off-package. Fortunately for him, the operator finally decided to suspend his bill.
