Roaming charges whilst data roaming turned off

[bcracknell]

I was on holiday in the US last month and had data roaming turned off before I even left the UK. At no point did I turn my data roaming on. Three texted me randomly at 3 points during my trip saying hello and welcome to the USA, outlining the costs associated with using my phone whilst in the USA. These texts were not telling me I was using my data, just letting me know I could. I've just received my bill to find I've been charged 3x £5 plus VAT for roaming services whilst in the USA. I can see on my bill that these supposed usages were really tiny amounts of data, <10MB. When I tried to dispute these charges, stating that I had my date roaming turned off the entire time,  I was told there was no way the system could be incorrect. However, clearly, the system is wrong if I can be charged tiny amounts of data usage whilst my data roaming is turned off. Please can you advise what I can do in this situation? 

[danielshanahan]

Update regarding my post yesterday. I contacted the Three Customer Service Team just now via the online chat facility and clearly spelled out the timeline of what's happened in a similar, but shorter version of my post above. I was initially told that the charges were valid as I had used data, however asked the agent to re-read my message (which included a link to this thread) and reconsider the response. The case has now been sent for investigation and I need to contact them back in 48 hours for an outcome. Apparently they can't contact me with the outcome, I have to chase.

Such a shame that this issue has been going on for so long and affected so many people with no resolution.

[danielshanahan]

Clearly no one has taken this seriously. Here are the case notes from the 'investigation'...

'Kindly note as per the usage details cust have been correctly charged Daily go roam charges as per process on support it is already mentioned any cust who have joined or upgraded on or after 01-10-21 will be charged go roam charges if roaming abroad as checked cust was romaing in Switzerland NO billing error cust billed correctly Case closed SMS sent'

Needless to say the next step is to call and try and speak to someone with some common sense.

[atommyk]

Yeah I'm getting the same. Have opened a case but nobody is actually reading the complaints and just providing lectures on how the charges are accurate. 

[ScottC]

I had similar response that there was no billing errors.  But I forced them to open a technical ticket instead because data roaming was not active.  Still have not heard back.

Even though Three did give me a credit but this is not sustainable as I have to travel abroad often and the issue will continue to come up.  Unfortunately, I am locked in a contract for another year.  Otherwise, I would switch to O2 with free data roaming (also saving me money having to get local eSIM).  Three!  Are you listening???

[danielshanahan]

After a bit of a battle I've managed to get the £10 refunded. The reason given for the charges was apparently because whenever the phone connects to a foreign network it sends a small amount of data and this is unavoidable, even when Data Roaming is turned off. I was told that I could apply a spend cap, however as others have noted, this is useless in case you want to make a phone call or send a text. Apparently if I was to switch off both Data Roaming and Mobile Data the charges shouldn't happen. I go to Copenhagen next weekend and I'm curious as to whether turning off both Data Roaming and Mobile Data will indeed work, however I'm more likely to just remove my SIM for a few days as I don't want the frustration of being charged again.

I also misunderstood one thing in my original post. I mentioned that my travels to Egypt, Morocco and Albania were not charged the £5, that's because they're not actually Go Roam Around the World destinations. They're charged by the kilobyte apparently. So maybe I wasn't billed for that usage as perhaps it came to less than a penny or something.

Going forward, happy to provide any input into this as previously mentioned, however ultimately my final solution to this will likely be to just leave Three in October when my sim only contract is up. Shame, but there are cheaper deals out there from companies that are also able to circumvent this ridiculous billing anomaly.

Good luck to everyone on this. I will check in from time to time and hope this eventually gets sorted.

[ScottC]

Hi, I ran into the same issue and not getting any solution from Three either.  Class action lawsuit?

[apadley1337]

Having moved to Smarty now - I can confirm I no longer get any of these issues. I have had to get an eSIM for travel outside Europe but that's no problem (Europe data/calls are included with SMARTY).

Looking into this in more detail, the issue is likely with the roaming partner in question rather than 3 but 3 are by no means off the hook here. When you roam, you connect to the visitor network and they bill the home network. Usually the roaming network will strip out erronous 'system' network traffic that should not be billed but this is obviously not happening here. Not wishing to defend 3 but they don't know what traffic the roaming network is billing against. The issue came about because 3 decided to switch to 'trigger' billing where any traffic would initiate a charge.

Previously. international roaming was included in the rate, so I suspect, over the years, as these errors crept in, three didn't have to worry about it but with the switch, these erroneous charges from the visitor network are having an effect. The only solution I can think of is, that if 3 are not prepared to go through a round of TADIG testing with each roaming partner - to find out where the billing error is, is to leave Three for a network that doesn't offer 'trigger' charging, where this issue can present itself. This is not a new issue; roaming is notoriously complex but as its complex, companies need to spend time getting this right!

Companies like Smarty, a subsidiary of 3, likely have performed more recent testing.

[Jnet80]

My sons phone (iPhone) was charged roaming in September 2023 even though his data and roaming was turned off. I managed to get that refunded from Three on our return.

We have just returned from another holiday in the USA and again he has been charged 5 times roaming. Due to this happening back in September we made extra sure that roaming was off and data was off. Spoke to Three and the person I spoke was not interested at all. He said as we had it refunded in September they cannot refund again and said we should have removed the sim during the holiday...really??? I have asked for this to be escalated which will take 48 hours and they are supposed to be ringing me back today. What should my next steps be if they refuse to acknowledge its a common issue with them?. Luckily my sons contract has just ended so we will be leaving them but want this sorting first. Also I am.pretty sure back in September when we had this issue and spoke with three we put spending cap on his contract 

[IBR17XVII]

IME as soon as I said I was going to the Ombudsman they refunded the whole amount.

It took a few times of back & forth though.

[atommyk]

This is all just too complicated in my point of view. Having set the spend cap to 0 (or close to) and roaming off my three account shows I am able to call uk numbers from abroad but when I'm trying to do that I cannot - I get a recorded message that my spend cap does not allow it. Previously, when changing the spend cap, I get billed for these 0.0009kb data transfers at 2am. To me, these makes the mobile connection unusable when abroad. The main selling points for being with Three (no frills, cost effective, no headache when abroad) have all evaporated and I'll be looking to join O2 as soon as possible. Even though the monthly bill will be higher, sanity will be preserved by not having to spend hours with Three support.