Way Over Charged!

"I cannot believe AT&T would let me dial an international number eith
out a plan and not kowing it was over $3.99 per minute."

Ok can you imagine for just a second that they did not allow you to
call? Would that make you happy? I doubt it.

It is your responsibiltiy to know your contract and know your charges.
You had 3 months of bills to figure it out...and you just kept calling
and calling.

You think another company will be different? That they will forbid you
to call outside the plan without someone holding your hand?

I am sure all your family and their associates/employees will love
having their plan uprooted because AT&T allowed you to make foreign
calls & you weren't able to figure out that you would get charged for
these calls. Sounds likely.

You make all these threats, with the news and fortune 500 and you
expect AT&T to help you? Ya I bet the news would like to know how that
goes for you. I would like to know too.

My son will be deploying to Afghanistan soon, and you bet I will check
my contract/options before I go blindly making calls for 3 months.
That would be the responsible thing to do.

How did AT&T ALLOW you to do this? Did you not call to find out how
much this would be in addition to your bill?
On my contract with AT&T it specifically notes that overseas calls are
an additional charge and are not included in my normal minutes.

I agree with most of the comments below, you had a bill that you
didn't dispute that I'm sure listed the charges, and it's not up to
AT&T to decide a line where it's customers might think a charge is
high and inform them of it.

I will also point out that what is being charged to reach other
counties isn't really relevent here. You yourself point out that
Afghanistan is active war zone. I have to think that complicates
communications some.

I went on AT&T wireless website and found the cost to call Afghanistan
in 2 minutes. As a consumer you are responsible for your actions.

I would think that someone whose partner is overseas would prefer
being able to call a phone in the other country -- with the
understanding that they would pay for the call -- to having to jump
through a series of hoops to establish that they know what the rate is
before being able to call.

What if, heaven forbid, something happened to your partner? Would you
really want to have to go through your phone company's bureaucracy
before you could find out how he is?

You made some bad decisions. Really bad decisions with really
unpleasant consequences. And you appear to have made them out of
ignorance. But now you seem to be advocating a really bad "solution"
-- sure, it would have prevented this particular bad consequence, but
it would have a whole lot of other consequences that aren't too
appealing either.

If I were to find that a national news network was suggesting that
there is something wrong with allowing adults not under
conservatorship to place phone calls when they want to under phone
contracts they chose, that network would lose a lot of credibility
with me. On the other hand, if a national news network ran a story
about someone whose partner was injured in Afghanistan and died some
time later, well after the US partner started trying to contact them
but well before the US partner's phone company had ensured that their
customer understood the financial consequences of placing that phone
call, and if that network took the position that adults not under
conservatorship should be presumed competent to handle their own
affairs, I would absolutely agree with that network's take on things.

I think you should have inquired to the costs of these calls BEFORE
making them. You're probably going to have to pay thie bill.

"I am shocked and furious! I cannot believe AT&T would let me dial an
international number eith out a plan and not kowing it was over $3.99
per minute."

That's a fairly naive assumption. It's the customer's responsibility
to know the rates. I agree $3.99 is ridiculous, but AT&T had no way of
knowing you were ignorant of the charges, especially when even you
state you continued to call at this rate.

And as someone very accurately pointed out below, this isn't the first
bill you received with the charges listed.

Good luck switching to Verizon though. I''m pretty certain they have
the same policy.

Yes and no.

There ARE military phone lines but not the way you're thinking.


A true military phone calls DSN (Defense Switched Network) at no
charge to the military. http://www.disa.mil/dsn/

However, it's not for personal calls - official business only.

I personally got to call home via DSN once but *only* because there
was a death in the family and a Red Cross message had been generated.
(my aunt had died). So, for that call I was connected to the local
base where my family was, and they patched me in to Mom & Dad.



Now... there ARE cheap ways to call your loved ones in the military
while they are overseas.

1) Note - if you are dialing a foreign number you WILL be paying
international rates. Doesn't matter if you're calling a base or not,
it will be international

2) Ask your spouse or family member if there is a US number you can
call them at. Some bases actually have it set up so that the number
you call is actually registered in the US, so you only pay US rates.

3) Internet access. If your s/fm has internet access he/she may want
to consider some kind of VOIP account.

I personally used Skype when I was in Japan. I bought a phone number
that was local to my family so, they called my local number, but... I
answered my computer in Japan. So, it was free for them to call me.

You may need to have your s/fm talk to the command about it though.
If it's a danger area VOIP may be disallowed due to security concerns.

"I am shocked and furious! I cannot believe AT&T would let me dial an
international number eith out a plan and not kowing it was over $3.99
per minute"

Really? Because it seems that they sent you 3 bills telling you that
you were being charged per minute. This arguement may have worked in
the first month, but by the third it simply holds no water.

Good answer - and you know AT&T is shaking in their boots, LOL

Ah the threat of losing customers due to another customers ignorance.

I always love seeing the "my brothers second cousin twice removed once
saw the president on TV and he is going to tell him to make a law
banning your company" type threats.

Anywho...

As many have stated its your responcibility to know where you can
call. If you just assumed you could call the middle east for cheap
then thats your problem. Having a local and long distance plan doesnt
mean you can call China for free.

Setup a payment plan and learn from this.

It is not their responsibility to tell you the rate prior to making
the call, it's your responsibility to find out if you are making calls
out of the norm.

All cell companies charge for calls that are not answered. This is
spelled out in the contract you signed.

You will run into the exact same situations with Verizon. You can
either use a calling card or call the carrier and see if they have
some sort of package.

I do not understand what you mean about countries next to Afghanistan
only charging $.34 a minute. If they are closer, of course the rates
are going to be cheaper.

Large corporations do not make business decisions like choosing a
wireless carrier based on the experience or recommendation of one
person. They have bidding processes they follow and don't choose
vendors because John Doe's cousin, friend, uncle, brother or roomate
had a good or bad experience with them.

WHy do you think you'd have cheap rates calling overeas to the Middle
East? Doesn't everyone know that you have to set up plans? Just like
with landlines and long-distance service.

And please, stop with the empty threats. Your brother is NOT going to
change his company's cell phone plan because of YOUR mistake.

Make payment arrangements and learn from this.

Just like any other phone call that you make with your phone, it is
your responsibility to find out what the rates are before placing a
call.

When you received the "reasonable" bill for $150, did you inspect it
to find out what the rate was? It seems to me you had plenty of
warning before racking up the two large bills that followed.

Often people write to companies and say they are the head of the IT
department, or that they make the decision for thousands of people
that may switch companies. I'm amazed that so many important people
are out there.

It is your responsibility to know the rates before you make so many
calls. I can understand if you made one emergency call without knowing
what the rates were. However, several calls without checking with AT&T
what the rates were for international calling to a specific country is
not their problem. International calling is always considerably more
than domestic. My suggestion is to contact AT&T to arrange a payment
plan.

It is not their fault you did not know the charge before dialing the
number.

I recommend a calling card