Charged for Facetime Audio Calls - Absolutely ridiculous.

[petr3001]

So I have been charged for calls that I know for a fact were FaceTime audio calls. I have called Vodafone 4 times now and every time I call, I get a different answer from them. A few people have told me that they can't explain it and will ask someone to have a look at my bill and I never hear back from them.

The 3rd person I spoke to said they would send my bill to get re-calculated or something along the lines of that and I called again today and the person I spoke to told me that it is a valid charge because I was connected to a US data signal. She insisited that I was wrong and I must not have been on Wi-Fi and that there is no way this is an error that Vodafone could make.

This is the screen that I use to launch my Facetime Audio calls, every single time. I am very careful when I do this. Facetime has a very distinctive ring which is very different to any normal ring, so even after I tap the button, I know for sure that it's going through facetime. 

The charges made my bill MUCH higher than it usually is. It's usually around £100 or so, and it jumped to £300 in March. I have no idea what to do at this point and am certainly not paying money for calls that were made through facetime. If Vodafone has LEGAL RIGHT to charge me for making this kind of call to the USA, they might as well start charging me for Skype calls. It's the exact same thing.

I am extremely frustrated.

[Nabs]

I woudl hazard a guess that Facetime has failed to connect the call and rolled it back to a standard phone call hence you have been charged.

Vodafone have no involvement in facetime as it's a service run by Apple.

[Retired-Andy]

Hi petr3001,

Our Moderator Matt has sent a PM giving the reasons your images were removed.

I’ve spoken to our technical support team who’ve advised that FaceTime audio uses a data access point.

As the calls you’ve made show a time duration, rather than a data figure, it confirms Nabs’ suggestion that a standard phone call was made.

You can see the charges for calling abroad here.

The charges will be correct for the usage and we'd be unable to refund them.

Thanks,

Andy

[petr3001]

So Vodafone just expects me shell out this much money for something that isn't my fault? I do not have the money to pay and I am 100% certain the calls were made through Facetime. This is the the first time it has happened and I have been making facetime audio calls to the USA for at least 3-4 months now.

[petr3001]

I just got off the phone with Apple.

They said there is NO way that the phone could have gone through data as Facetime is strictly to be used with data 3G and WiFi. Even if the connection were to fail, it would not go through my network no matter what. It is not programmed to work that way. 

[Ben_H]

Hi petr3001,

If you'd like my team to check the call charge for you, I've sent instructions on how to reach us here.

Thanks, Ben

[Gracel0987764]

They charge you ANYTIME you choose the Audio setting on FaceTime or Viber. Their rational is that these apps can be used free for their 'intended purpose' video calls, but despite using wifi I paid for with BT, they will charge you when you select audio. They told me its on the website somewhere but haven't sent it through to me. I think this is outrageous. There was no service rendered and I'm stuck with a £100 phone call on my bill. It seems anti competitive. I own my own phone outright so I don't see why I can't download and use WIFI within my plan limits without incurring a £3/min charge. At the VERY least they should have this clearly spelled out in their plan package descriptions.

[Jenny]

Hi @Gracel0987764

I’m sorry you feel that way.

So we can look into this further, get in touch with our Live help team.

Thanks,

Jenny

[petr3001]

I just reset my password just so I could reply to you.

Vodafone were absolutely useless and did nothing to help me. I spent HOURS on the phone to people and they did nothing.

They are a HORRIBLE company and I tell EVERYONE I know to stay as far as they can from Vodafone. If someone I know is on Vodafone, I convince them to switch to something better because they will have a problem eventually and Vodafone will be useless.

I will never ever use anything to do with Vodafone again. Disgusting.