Companies responsible for "parenting" our children

[detroitmotorcity]

This is classic. I can't tell you how many times I've read the same story... The parents give their kid a cellphone. The kid runs up a huge bill... The parents cry "scam" and expect the company to take the blame.

http://complaint.tv/cingular_wireless-350.html

I particularly like the part about how the kid said they don't know how it happened... something about internet pictures...

PARENTS need to do take responsibility for these situations... not look to blame everyone else!

[tollbaby]

wow... that's just dumb

[Catwoman2965]

Yes, very dumb. Sounds like a case of someone who couldn't be bothered to LISTEN to what the rep was saying about plans, costs, etc. what was included, what was extra, and now is trying to blame someone else.

Either that, or just didn't understand how cell phones and plans work, but if that's the case, THEN DON'T GET ONE! or get a prepaid....and add minutes as needed.

[solemnwarning]

I never saw the point in contract/bill phones.
Most phones over here are pay as you go (prepaid)

I think I use ~5GBP per month on mine....

[Shabo]

Wow... $1000 in a month. That's pretty impressive. You know, I have an idea for preventing/safeguarding this kid from future bills of that nature-- TAKE AWAY THE PHONE!!

Sure, teaching this kid responsibility is important, but that's a pretty big mess up. I can't even imagine that kind of bill. That is seriously amazing. And then the grandmother thinks that it's not her precious little granddaughters fault. Um, sure, whatever you want to think Grammie.

[Ducky Dew]

Ok, not a customer of anyone but this reminded of something that happened once at our house. This was several years before Caller ID and that type of thing.

My step son was 15 at the time and had only been living with us a few months. His aunt, who was around 22 at the time and a total ditz, told him that you could third party bill a long distance phone call and they'd never find out where it came from. Now, anyone with half a brain realizes there are all kinds of problems with that idea. Not this kid. He proceeds to make over $400 worth of calls from our home phone, and remember, this is $400 about 12 years ago, to a girl he has NEVER SEEN. A cousin of a friend, she lives in the state but just far enough away to make it long distance.

And he bills them to his Principal's phone number!

Yeah, he had to work to pay it off, and yeah, he didn't speak to that particular aunt for over a year, until just before he went back to live with his Mother. And to this day he wouldn't listen to her if she said rain was wet.

[myswtghst]

A few like this have cropped up on PFB lately too, and not surprisingly, the overwhelming majority of the comments have to do with teaching your kids responsibility and having them work to pay off the bill.

I didn't have a cell phone until I was 16 and had a driver's license. At that time, I used the phone to stay in touch with my parents when I had the car, and to give them updates as to when I'd be home. That was it. I didn't start using the phone for more than the occasional call home until I got to college and started footing the bill. Strange, how I never rang up a huge bill.

[GyroKat]

Some people never learn. My little brother got a cellphone, which automatically takes money out of my mum's bank accoutn whenever it reaches 0. My brother only used his phone to text friends and so my mum could reach him anyway, so the phone would only withdraw money once or twice a month, and not much each time. All was fine.

A year later, our little sister got a phone as well, same plan as my brother. My mum hadn't really realised that my sister is girls, and thus had 10 girlfriends to keep in touch with ALL THE TIME, whereas my brother was satisfied seeing his friends in and after school.

I still remember my mum screaming "HOW THE HELL DID YOU MANAGE TO SEND 700 TEXTS IN A WEEK?!"

However, my mum is different from a SC: She then proceeded to teach my sister some responsibility, and they agreed that if my sister ever ran up a huge bill again, it would be taken from her allowance, even if it would take her 6 months to pay back. She's been behaving ever since.

[Elf]

Wow. I don't think I had a cell till I was 21. Even then I didn't make too many calls. My cousin who is 3 years younger than me had managed to rack up a similar phone bill thanks to text messages just before I finally got my phone. These days after spending my week getting yelled at by SC's on the phone all day I tend to avoid talking on my phone. I have unlimited texts and that's fine with me.

What amuses me is that my aunt never blamed my cousin for the huge phone bill. She blamed their carrier. I've never understood the logic behind that.

[Brightglaive]

Since my wife works for VZW she hears these type of complaints on a daily basis. The problem is, is Grammie (or Mom) didn't read the fine print of her contract which states that while in-carrier mobile-to-mobile minutes are free (this is usually the case in most family plans) Picture messages and text messages have a per message charge. usually from $0.02 to $0.25 PER message. If the phone has no text message plan attached to the service then the costs can be even higher. Some companies charge you to send a text/picture message and to receive a text/picture message. Assuming that's the case and there was no text package attached to beloved granddaughter's phone plan then at $0.99 per text message in or out it would be easy peasy lemon squeezy to rack up $1000 of text/picture messages esp. for a teenage girl texting grandma and her friends and receiving text messages from her friends and grandma over the period of a month. Add to the fact that if you activate your plan in the middle of the month the carrier has no choice but to pro-rate EVERYTHING.

While normally pro-rating would be a good thing as you only pay for the service you are receiving in that period, in the case of cellphones, it is BAD. This can double the cost of any bill because the carrier normally provides a low-cost all-you-can-eat plan at a discounted flat-rate. When the service is pro-rated they will charge (usually)a flat per minute charge (which is more than the discounted flat-rate for the plan) . So calls to Grammie (or her friends) were probably billed on a higher rate and any overages were also charged at a higher rate.


All the carriers do this in the USA. Don't know about the UK or ROW (Rest-of-World).

Is it any wonder Why a teenage girl ran up a $1000 bill when the companies are doing this and charging a $50-$150 activation fee? We're get raked over the coals.

BTW, This pro-ration happens whenever you disconnect service in the middle of the month as well.


Brightglaive

[Andara Bledin]

This is insane.

What makes it even moreso is that with my provider (T-Mobile) I can get unlimited texting for something like $7 a month.

^-.-^

[Shabo]

Yep, but Grams probably didn't pay attention and got her beloved GD the cheapest plan, since they won't be using their phones much. Right. They do sell childrens phones where the parent can limit the numbers that the child can call, can limit the time the child can make calls, can limit the number of minutes the child has every month, etc. So basically, it's a training cell phone. My cousin has one that she can only use to call her mom, and it works great for her. My brother and sister both want one, and I keep telling my parents to get them the kiddie phones. Only way to prevent this sort of disaster until the kid gets over the novelty of having a phone of their own.

[Annichka]

I get those calls all the time
CS= Customer

ME: xxx-xxxx went 1500 minutes over their plan and used 800 text messages (cell overage was $0.45/ per minute and texts are $0.15/per message)
CS: but that's little Suzie's number and she only uses her phone to call me and she says she NEVER uses that textin' stuff...
ME: Alright Ma'am take a look at page 7 of the call detail to see if she only called you...( Bracing self for fun)
CS: Alriiiiight, but Suzie would NEVER lie to m-........ that's her friend Jennie's number, and Melissa's and Haley's, and... (away from the phone) SUZIE!! YOU GET YOUR F@!#$@%& A$$ IN HERE!
Then the beating insues like in "A christmas story"

[greensinestro]

You mean to say someone actually had the gall to publish this on the internet? Didn't look like anyone sided with that person either. I am a firm believer that children should not even have a cellular phone of their own, but if a parent deems it necessary for them to have one, then it should be one with limits. Something like the bare bones service retirees in South Florida get on their land line phones, complete with long distance restrictions and other blocking features.

A good friend of mine gave her son a cellular phone and it had texting capabilities. Within a month, after she received a $100 phone bill for that one phone, she immediately had this removed, and she made him work it off!

When I was a kid, I did not even know what I was missing. If I needed to call my parents from school, I went to the office and called. If I was at a friend's house, I called from their landline phone. Even now, I hardly use my cellular phone, except only when needed. I don't get into talking to people I saw all day long at work.

[greensinestro]

I never really had a reason to have a cellular phone. I did not get one until I was 26, and I only got it after breaking down along side the road. Luckily, I was near a Wal Mart with a pay phone, plus a couple of nice guys in the neighborhood called a tow truck for me on their cellular phones. Until that happened, I never saw the need for one.

Lately, my stepchildren have been told over and over by my wife about using the landline phone for their personal calls. My stepson usually does not use his, but my stepdaughter does, and was using it when she could use the landline phone to call her girlfriends. Yes, some were on the same network as her, making it part of her unlimited mobile to mobile, but other times she was calling other landline numbers or cellulars on different networks.

The horror stories go on though. Back in 1998, when I purchased my first new car on my own, the car dealer discovered I worked for the phone company, and he wanted to know if anything could be done about his $900 phone bill that his daughter rung up! I told him most likely not, being if his daughter was the one that abused the priviledge, then the company would sustain those charges. I wanted to say something like "Make your daughter work off the charges" but I held my ground on that. Not my place to tell a person how to raise their kid.