Mobile browsing & data charges

[mell1969]

I bought my first Blackberry Curve 9300 in April. I took out a pay monthly contract which allows me 100mb of data per month, with unlimited data for the first 3 months.  I received a warning message yesterday  which states that my average usage per month is around 184mb. I looked at my account online and found that at 0.00 everyday Blackberry was using up, up to 8mb for mobile browsing and data charges. I have no idea what this is for. I used BBM several times a day, have downloaded a couple of tiny apps and have used the internet only a few times. Please could someone help me. Thank you.

[AnnS]

Hello mell1969

Your data usage for the day is calculated at midnight.  It does not mean that you are using 8mb at 0.00.

If you are using more than the 100mb allowance during the data test drive, it may be worth asking Vodafone to add additional data at the end of the three months which will be a lot cheaper than paying the daily rate.

[nnk_carol]

Hi 

Don't forget to switch off your data roaming otherwise you can get hit by unexpected charges.  Go to Menu > Options > Mobile Network and switch off data services while roaming.  All other costs while you're away can be checked here

http://www.vodafone.co.uk/personal/price-plans/pay-as-you-go/travelling-abroad/index.htm

Have a great trip away!

[pau1j]

Hi Mell.

8MB per day sounds quite a lot - average day for me (emails & occasional browsing) is around 1MB & almost never above 4MB per day.

BBs are usually pretty light on data as most is compressed and sent via RIM servers (that's the BIS you're paying for).  Remember though, the bill will be for upload & download so will be higher than you expect.

Can you give an idea of the apps you've download & are using?

Some might be running in the background & sending/receiving without you realising - particularly social networking apps (Facebook, Twitter, Social Feeds, etc).

If you want to double check your usage, the BB has a basic data counter built-in.  Go to Options > Device > Status and type BUYR ... the screen will expand downwards & show Data Usage.  This is the count since the phone was new (or, at least, since it was last Factory Reset).  Keep a record over 4 or 5 days for a reasonable average.

Hope this helps.

[mell1969]

Hi, thanks very much for all your replies.

I have spoken to Vodafone today. They've told me to turn the data services off in the evening to stop receiving automatic updates and then I won't use my mb allowance up. I only got the phone for the BBM and txt! I have checked the usage since the phone was first used and I have used 500mb of data! Does this make sense to anyone? I am really confused!

[mell1969]

The apps I have downloaded are a screen muncher, a couple of games ( hangman and bubble breaker) some fancy smilies and themes. I understand these don't use many mb?! I only started using appworld in the last month, the mb being used by Blackberry started the day I bought the phone on 23rd April. Some nights over 12mb is being used. What have I done wrong?! Any ideas would be gratefully received. Thank you.

[pau1j]

I think the automatic updates suggestion is a bit of a red herring ... updates to BBs & apps are elective (you have to actively select the update).  As is the Vodafone bill showing midnight (as AnnS says, this is the daily usage lumped into one billing line so don't assume it's all night-time usage).

The 500MB of data used - was that from your bills or from the BUYR counter mentioned above?

Do you tend to send photographs, music, voice messages, etc. via BBM?

Is the usage high every day (including weekends) or does it fluctuate?

Can you think of anything you did on the days it was especially high (or low)?

Are the themes you downloaded active (i.e. do they change during the day or week which would indicate they're downloading something)?

You can see which applications are running in the background by holding the BB button for a couple of seconds (core apps - Browser, BBM, Messages, Phone - will always show) but are there any others?

Unfortunately, this doesn't show all running modules ... the only way to check which applications are running through the day is to look in Application Management.  The CPU (Today) option should tell you which applications have been running during the day - if there are any unusual ones let us know.  I don't think there's any certain way to determine which application is using the data (although there may be third-party apps which can tell).

[mell1969]

Hi Paul, thanks again for you help.

The 500MB was from the BUYR which has never been factory reset.

The usage is high most days and I cannot think of any reason why this should be so.

I never send music and have only occasionally sent photos or voice messages.

The themes are not running actively.

I checked the CPU and virtually nothing is running

I pressed the BB button and the only other thing on it is Home

The Vodafone person mentioned that as my phone is not connected to wi-fi while at home, the updates (if there are any) will come out of my allowance.

The only thing I use regularly is BBM. I have around 130 contacts and gererally receive at least 20 messages a day. Could this be using up my MB's?

I also have something called WAP on my bills. This is for pretty small amounts compared to the Blackberry charges. Could somebody please tell me what these charges could be for?

Thank you.

[pau1j]

I can't imagine that 20 BBM messages would amount to a great deal - perhaps 1 or 2 KB per message, unless there are attachments. The BBM app will also use data when one of your contacts changes status or photograph - again, I can't see that this would amount to much.

Unfortunately, I can't think of much else to check - short of disabling BBM for a day to see if it makes a difference.

The WAP charges are for 'other' data - i.e. data that isn't routed via RIM servers. This might be an application that is using Vodafone's data network directly (browsing to Vodafone websites is direct too, I think) or it might just be the BB 'phoning home' throughout the day. Either way, it's low so nothing to worry about.

One thing I would suggest that you check (and one of the mod's may be able to confirm) ... a recent poster on here (Blackberry Services) said he had been put in a similar situation as you. He signed for BB but seemed to have been put on the Data Test Drive & then asked for more money after three months. I was under the impression that once you'd paid for BIS, or had BIS on your tariff, that was it ... all Blackberry data was included. I imagine there would be some sort of fair usage policy, but once you've paid for BIS access that included all BB Browsing, BBM & App World data.

[pau1j]

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pau1j wrote:

One thing I would suggest that you check (and one of the mod's may be able to confirm) ... a recent poster on here (Blackberry Services) said he had been put in a similar situation as you. He signed for BB but seemed to have been put on the Data Test Drive & then asked for more money after three months. I was under the impression that once you'd paid for BIS, or had BIS on your tariff, that was it ... all Blackberry data was included. I imagine there would be some sort of fair usage policy, but once you've paid for BIS access that included all BB Browsing, BBM & App World data.

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The hyperlink for the post doesn't seem to have been included: http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/t5/BlackBerry/Blackberry-Services/td-p/1191453

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Dave CD wrote:

Once you have paid for BIS or it is included in your tariff there would be no additional charges for this unless you exceeded your data allowance

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Thanks Dave ... so the data allowance includes Blackberry & WAP (rather than WAP only with BIS, effectively, already paid for)?

The tariffs (http://shop.vodafone.co.uk/shop/mobile-price-plans/all-plans) really aren't straightforward - for a given price, there seems to be a BB & a non-BB tariff with nothing else to choose between them.  Yet the above poster okj6 has been asked to pay (again) for BIS.