topic Re: No knowing international phone numbers in Mobile Services

No knowing international phone numbers

Moh18 — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 11:30:52 GMT

My wife called Qatar airlines on their uk number from her ee phone to cancel her booking (the ee contract is in my name). They gave her a number and asked her to ring it. She rang the number twice totalling about 70 minutes. To my horror and dismay my next bill was over £300. I talked to ee and told me the number that my wife rang is an American number and my contract doesn’t include such calls. The most important thing here is that my wife didn’t know the number was in America let alone that our contract doesn’t include calls to America. Ee agreed to reimburse me with a low amount.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

XRaySpeX — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 11:58:03 GMT

@Moh18 : If the dialled no. started "+1" or "001" it would be in USA.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

Chris_B — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 12:32:12 GMT

@Moh18 Your call allowance only covers UK numbers ( not including premium rate numbers)

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

bristolian — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 12:55:40 GMT

What was the specific number your wife called? Calls from the UK to 0800 numbers are free, 01/02/03-prefixed numbers are inclusive within your allowance. The number listed on https://www.qatarairways.com/en-gb/help.html is an 0330 number which would be inclusive.

International calls are always chargeable, although add-ons are available to reduce the cost. The standard rate - without any add-ons - for pay-monthly calls to the USA are £4.21/minute, which at 70minutes is around £294.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

XRaySpeX — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 13:02:25 GMT

OP did call their UK no. but was given verbally a no. to call which turned out to be a US no.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

bristolian — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 13:21:17 GMT

My points were directed at the OP, to clarify (as much for the benefit of the wider forum) the number they called.

There would certainly be grounds for complaint with Qatar Airlines if the "redirect" was not expressly pointed out.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

chistery — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 13:41:37 GMT

Hopefully EE explained about adding a spend cap to prevent this happening again?

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

XRaySpeX — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 13:45:08 GMT

This all boils down to being aware of the form of International nos & dialling codes. W/out such knowledge you'll soon end up clocking up big bills.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

Chris_B — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 16:28:25 GMT

EE are not responsible for any refund regardless of not knowing what number anyone is calling. It’s down to that person to be aware of who they are calling regardless of how they acquired that number to call. In this case take the small refund and be grateful that even a goodwill gesture refund was offered in the first place as it didn’t have to be.

To be honest I don’t know why this post was even created in the first place.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

bristolian — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 16:38:53 GMT

Anything that creates awareness of number ranges, and what calls are likely to be chargeable, can only be a good thing.

I would agree that, on the basis of the info posted in this thread so far (notably no number cited by the OP), then EE have no blame and fault appears to lie with Qatar Airways for suggesting an international call without being clear.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

Chris_B — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 18:52:18 GMT

I’m not sure why you’ll have to call a US number to cancel a flight when there is a UK customer services for this airline.

Re: No knowing international phone numbers

bristolian — Fri, 05 Apr 2024 18:55:25 GMT

@Chris_B wrote:

I’m not sure why you’ll have to call a US number to cancel a flight when there is a UK customer services for this airline.

Indeed so - this is why I mentioned that, based on the info posted in this thread so far, the OP appears to have valid cause for complaint with Qatar Airlines.

I rather suspect the OP won't return to this thread to update, which would be a shame.