BuRR

I say report to the police immediately and get a crime number.

Stop all direct debits to Orange from her bank account, so they can't get any money from the account.

Have a word with the officer who is allocated the crime to deal with (make sure that she signs a data protection form for the police - they'll not have any joy from orange in relation to the account unless she gives the police the permission to access the calls.) Maybe a call to a supervisor from the officer may bring a different route to go down, rather than the initial call-handling staff's - ultimately these people read off a checklist when people ring in with a theft or a claim, so anything out of the ordinary usually leaves them in a fluster somewhat.

Failaing all that, write to the insurance company that orange deal with - as far as I'm aware they are independent from Orange and may take a different view.

j.r-xrs

First of all, I'm sorry to here about that and secondly, what the hell! That’s totally outrageous if you have rung them and cancelled the phone after 3 hours of it being stolen then they should not be able to charge for calls, made "out of pattern". When did she contact the police to let them know about the robbery? If this was within that 3hours then the police should have a record of it and any call made after that time should be disqualified from the bill!

Having the police will increase your chance 10 fold (or at least it should). Orange don’t even have to pay for those calls, if they were made from her phone to Europe, then they will not have gone through any other satellites than that the Orange one, which makes them free of all costs for Orange.

J.R-XRS

boomer

Which country did the thieves call?

GBP500 for 180 minutes works out at GBP2-78 per minute, and the most expensive international call from the UK on Orange is only 80p!!

I presume that this was a PAYG phone?

mb

j.r-xrs

No it must have been a contract or it would have just run out of credit!

J.R-XRS

Luke

Thought most companies only allow International calls when your credit is good. (not saying hers wasnt). But for them to say this amount would not flag a computer sounds a bit weird.
technicaly she might have to pay...... But instruct her bank not to allow further payments.

boomer

J.R-XRS

I just realised that (Doh!).

The insurance says that you must report the theft/loss within 8 hours of "discovery", so 3 hours should be well inside the limit. I never thought about "calls" though - i always assumed that it would be like a credit card, thus max liability say GBP50 but which is normally waived.

KF,

I would NOT recommend that your sister cancels any Direct Debits! She has a contract with Orange and will get in deeper trouble by breaking it. However, the Direct Debit guarantee should allow her to dispute the GBP500, should Orange attempt to take it electronically.

At this stage i suggest that she gets all the facts together including dates and times and writes to Orange stating her case (as is not being charged for calls that she did not make).

mb

j.r-xrs

Yep I'm with Boomer on this one, defiantly the way to go!

J.R-XRS

KF

Cheers for the responses,
It did stike me as a large amount of money for 3 hours of calls, even if international. It was a contract phone.

Seems that in the small print somewhere Orange insurance must say, "doesn't cover you for call charges". The fact that they seem not to attempt to mitigate against this sort of loss disappoints me. I am certainly going to check the small print on the insurance I have on my mobile (different provider).

The delay between the robbery and the phonecall to cancel the phone was due to one upset woman reporting the crime / cancelling cards / trying to get home without money and assuming the only insured posession she was carrying (other than cards) was a slightly lower priority. An expensive lesson.

I think that she was considering cancelling the direct debit. I totally understand the point made, and will tell her not to.
Cheers,
KF.

j.r-xrs

Just a thought, but if they we charged so much for 3 hours of calls, is it possible that they rang a premeuim line in Eastern Europe, if so then Orange should be able to find out which one it was and subsiquentially who benefitted from the call?

Just an idea.

J.R-XRS

boomer

J.R-XRS,

Re: Premium rate termination

i am not sure whether this applies to mobile calls (as opposed to land-line ones). You pay the same rate to the country no matter what the internal destination is (land, mobile, premium etc.) and the remote telco takes the hit. I think that this is something that BT want to change, 'cos they can lose money (or at least not make as much money) on some incoming calls to the UK - i.e. ones that terminate to other mobile phone companies.

mb

j.r-xrs

Networks and charges (especially on Orange) aren't really my thing, I'm more interested in the technology side of things, as I say it was just an idea, not a fact!

Cheers

J.R-XRS

KF

BuRR, Boomer, Luke & jr-xrs,
Thanks for all your replies. My sister has just told me that discussion with Orange about the bill has yielded results.
The majority of calls on the bill were after the phone had been canceled - all but about £20 of calls.
The calls after the notification were naturally removed from her bill and as an apology for mucking her about they have waived the £20 of calls made before the report.

Good work Orange

It transpires that her friends (whom were attacked at the same time) are not quite so lucky, with their providers persuing them for the sums the thiefs ran up on their bills.

I guess the lesson is the same - check your policy wording, it may not offer you the protection you think it does.

Cheers guys.
KF.

EDIT: Spelt someone's handle wrong

[Edited by KF - 1/6/2002 9:07:56 PM]

boomer

KF,

that's great news, and a big relief for your sister i bet.

I re-read my insurance document (i too am with Orange) and there is no mention of insurance against fraudulent calls, but also no obvious mention of the exclusion - a little bit sneaky if you ask me!

So a lesson for us all - contact your network provider straight away following a theft, and also consider activating the PIN phone-lock - so thieves can't make calls in the first place. Now where did i leave my instructions

Good result, and well done.

mb

Jerome

Firstly, I'm glad it was all sorted in the end. But, I was with BT Cellnet and they put a "standard" £50 limit on my contract phone per month. If I reached that limit my phone was blocked for the rest of the month unless I called them to get it lifted (by increasing the limit). BT Cellnet also do not allow customers to call premium rate lines (I was trying to ring QPR Clubcall before anyone asks!)

Secondly, a guy was mugged recently and lay unconcious for 5 hours before he came round. Would he have been charged for calls made within those 5 hours I wonder? Even banks don't hold you liable for money taken out using your cashpoint cards if you were forced to tell the mugger your PIN's.

KF

EDIT : Please read my last post on this subject dated January 06, 2002. 21:01.


My sister had her Orange phone stolen when she was recently mugged, which is bad enough - but today she received a bill this month from Orange for £500.

Given that she has never used the phone to phone anywhere abroad, and never had a monthly bill more than £30, she was a little upset to find that Orange are going to persue her for the whole sum. The £500 of calls were made in the approximately 3 hours between the event and calling Orange to cancel the phone.
She had paid for Orange insurance - which would appear to exclude call charges.

Is this right?
Is she flustered and (understandably) misinterpreting the situation?
Is there no automated red-flag on their computers to indicate that there is an odd pattern of use on the phone?
Are Orange going to liase with the police to find the destination phone number (Eastern European) to attempt to find the perpetrator of the offence, and recover some of the money?

Any ideas would be gratefully received...
KF.

[Edited by KF - 1/6/2002 9:04:43 PM]