topic Roaming charges in Network

Roaming charges

Chrissy — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 10:11:15 GMT

Hi,

I went recently to continental Europe for just over two weeks. Before leaving the UK i turned roaming data off on my iPhone however, during my stay abroad I got charged for using data 5 times. Any ideas what could've triggered the data charges? I have an eSIM installed on my iPhone as it's simply cheaper than Three's daily charge, yet still got charged for using data despite turning it off completely. Any ideas welcome

Re: Roaming charges

sc1999 — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 10:54:43 GMT

The esim is with a different network? If yes and you were using it for roaming how do you turn the 3 sim off?

Re: Roaming charges

Clever-Trevor — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 15:31:43 GMT

Hi -

Its quite possible you had roaming ‘on’ for your Three SIM but also ‘data switching’ ( this is a setting that if no network on one sim it switches to the other - and might be just a small amount of data until your esim kicked in - but would then trigger a cost )

To be absolutely sure - you can ‘switch off’ your Three sim ( in settings ) but then no calls will come through….

Re: Roaming charges

Chrissy — Fri, 22 Sep 2023 09:24:21 GMT

Hi,

sc1999 - the esim is with a different network.
Clever-Trevor - data switching was turned off. The problem is I can't turn off Three's sim as need the texts and calls coming through

Just checked the bill - the amount of data used on every occasion was only 0.0009 MB

Re: Roaming charges

atommyk — Sat, 30 Sep 2023 06:32:24 GMT

I have the same problem over here. Weirdly I've been to Portugal about a month ago without any of these issues (also with eSIM from a different provider for the data usage). There I don't think I had a problem. Now travelled to Austria, I'm getting almost daily texts at 02:40-02:50 (I'm definitely asleep then) stating my new roaming charge has been applied. Why on earth? I have data roaming off, no data switching.

three support was not really useful. They have so far only suggested to switch off international roaming entirely but according to them that would cut me off completely when abroad. Not useful.

Re: Roaming charges

Gurj — Sun, 01 Oct 2023 13:53:15 GMT

Seeing same issues. I have just added a comment in this other thread:
https://community.three.co.uk/t5/Network/Roaming-charges-whilst-data-roaming-turned-off/m-p/17979

I've had the charges with and without using an ESIM while roaming with Data Roaming definitely off all the time and using an iPhone 14 Pro Max on latest iOS releases.

Re: Roaming charges

Gurj — Tue, 03 Oct 2023 20:32:37 GMT

Yes, support were useless for me to. Raised case which was then closed saying no problem the next day.

Re: Roaming charges

Gurj — Tue, 03 Oct 2023 20:41:10 GMT

Chrissy,

So far it seems at least 3 of us were using an iPhone. Were you on an iPhone 14 Pro too? Were you using iOS 17 (or beta version)?
My daughter's phone didn't get the USA charges and she was still on iOS16 until halfway through our recent holiday, then she started getting the SIM messages about roaming charges.

Re: Roaming charges

apadley1337 — Sat, 21 Oct 2023 09:37:50 GMT

I'm in the USA now and have just been charged a daily £5 charge right after I arrived, with roaming off. This is on two iPhones with ios 17 and 16.7.1. I did notice, that once I'd connected, a message popped up on my screen saying 'SIM is sending SMS message'. I presume this is some sort of carrier message that is triggering the charge, so nothing the user is doing and nothing to do with roaming. Very shady practice from 3

Re: Roaming charges

JonathanB — Mon, 23 Oct 2023 15:34:28 GMT

Hi @apadley1337,

I'm not familiar with any process where we'd be triggering an SMS, have you been able to see the charge on your billing? The other users that have mentioned this recently have said that the charge was assigned to data usage rather than a text on their itemised section of the bill.

Any sign of an outgoing message in your messages, or which App is actually sending the message?

Thanks,
Jonathan

Re: Roaming charges

apadley1337 — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 10:36:25 GMT

The charge appears as a 1kB data charge and happened a minute after both phones got the 'Welcome to the USA' message just after we landed. Roaming was off the whole time on both phones so whatever is being sent by the SIM is an SMS message but it is being billed as a data message.

Re: Roaming charges

JonathanB — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 13:14:50 GMT

Hey everyone,

We're still trying to find out what may be causing this issue, so I'm sending you each a PM to direct you to a team that can gather a bit more info from your accounts. Please have a chat with them, and they'll help get this escalated.

To view your private messages on the community, click on your avatar image in the top right of any community page, then "Messages".

Thanks,
Jonathan

Re: Roaming charges

Gurj — Sat, 28 Oct 2023 11:02:22 GMT

@JonathanB I confirmed on several family iPhones that there were no outgoing messages visible in the message app (during the entire visit to Florida) so if there was a message it was some sort of system/hidden mesage.

Being very small (0.9KB) does suggest some sort of small setup message. Possible causes could include:
- WiFi Calling setup for Three (since calls are still active)

- Some other sort of network setup message related to Three (perhaps triggered by the Three SIM)

- iPhone software bug using the wrong network for a very specific setup message (in my case I was using an ESIM from Airalo, so data was available, just not supposed to be via Three SIM).

Thanks,

Gurj

Re: Roaming charges

apadley1337 — Sat, 28 Oct 2023 15:09:05 GMT

Could be a roaming partner check that happens to make sure that your account is in good standing and three forgot to filter out the message from the user. SMS was originally created for this type of carrier communication. Hopefully it will be sorted soon. For ref, we are connected to AT&T

Re: Roaming charges

rossmac100 — Sun, 19 Nov 2023 05:35:48 GMT

I am also suffering from this same issue! It turns out it has been happening since February, using up my GoRoam passes unbeknownst to me... Wild, considering I was in South Africa and GoRoam doesn't apply there. And then I get hit with a bill which is £40 higher than expected for October. To add insult to injury, upon being text to say I was being charged £5/day to be in Australia, I spoke with the support team via chat who assured me there were no additional charges on my account. Oh, and, of course, when I raised the issue on the phone and via support chat (both first level and complaints, then with an escalation to the billing team for 'investigation') I was told that the billing is all correct. I'm tearing my hair out with frustration and have no idea what to do. I've done nothing wrong! Extract from one of my previous bills shown for reference.

Re: Roaming charges

JohnM — Thu, 23 Nov 2023 12:27:13 GMT

Hey @rossmac100,

Let's get this looked at!

The direct link included in the PM I have sent you will take you to our specialist team who will investigate this, as we cannot access your account information here on Communities.

To view your private messages on the community, click on your avatar image in the top right of any community page, then "Messages".

John M

Re: Roaming charges

milly1983 — Mon, 12 Feb 2024 19:28:03 GMT

I am also having this same issue. I get data charges with data turned off and for 1kb / 2kb whenever I turn on my phone abroad. I never had this issue prior to getting an esim recently which makes me wonder if it is the esim requesting data. I spoke to your customer support and they were no help at all. This is a recurring issue across multiple different users, why hasn't it been fixed?

Re: Roaming charges

atommyk — Mon, 12 Feb 2024 20:01:48 GMT

I don't think it's the eSim. Lots of us have standard sims still and we occur the same roaming charges despite roaming being switched off. I'm assuming you're on an iPhone as well? Would you mind posting iOS version and iPhone generation?

Re: Roaming charges

Bmanashe — Sun, 09 Jun 2024 15:19:53 GMT

Hi Jonathan, can you please investigate mine too. I keep getting charged random daily roaming charges whilst in Poland, even though I have a local e-sim installed and no day switching option turned on (the local e-sim is set as default for data and phone). Also seems to happen at around 2am- when asleep, as a lot of people have said! Not happy with keep on getting charged when I’ve gone out of my way to get a local e-sim installed.

Re: Roaming charges

Bmanashe — Sun, 09 Jun 2024 15:20:59 GMT

Sorry, that was supposed to say NO DATA SWITCHING TURNED ON