Unauthorised use of Mobile Data, in middle of the night

[gunnerdw]

My wife's data allowance on her Virgin Mobile plan regularly rolls over at the end of each month, as she virtually never makes any conscious use of it. Nearly all of the time, her usage of the phone is from within (or very near to) our house, making use of the Wi-fi.

However, having recently been to Spain, she inadvertently left her phone in 'Airplane' mode, which I believe meant that it would not connect to the Wi-fi, which we just did not notice. I fully accept that was our fault. Over the time since then, numerous WhatsApp messages and Facetime calls have gobbled up the allowance. We noticed this on Sunday (19th June) when during a call she received 3 messages (allowance 75% used, 95% used and all used - now being charged). We noticed the messages immediately after the call ended. This is when we spotted the 'Airplane' mode bit, turned it off, and studied the Mobile Data to confirm what had used it all - predominently Facetime and Whatsapp, as suspected.

We also looked at the bill and found that £3 had been charged for the excess data usage.

Today (Tuesday 21st June) she got another message to say that her £5 charge cap had been completely used up. Looking on her bill, it says that there was data usage of 90K connected to the internet at 01:18 this morning. At that time we were asleep, and the phone was not being used, and would have been connected to the Wi-fi anyway.

Apart from the issue of £2 charge for 90K of usage, there is the point of how do we find out what was connecting to the internet using mobile data rather than wi-fi, and how do we stop it from doing so in the future.

[Alex_RM]

Hi gunnerdw,

Thanks for posting and sorry there's some confusion over your data usage.

We tend to bundle all the data entries together around midnight or the bill would be very long. If the WiFi disconnected at any point during the night the data would then connect.

You can choose to turn data off on your handset to stop this from happening.

Alex_Rm

[gunnerdw · Accepted solution]

Thanks Alex_RM,

I know that we can turn data off on the handset, but it is a bit of a bind keep turning it off and on, on a regular basis.

I am not sure that you are able to tell which app is using data, even in real time whilst it is doing it. I just thought that you - or some people on the forum - might just know what apps will use the internet (whether over wifi or mobile data) in the middle of the night when nobody is touching the phone at all, as we are rather concerned about our allowance being used up without either our knowledge or our explicit permission.

I agree that if the wifi disconnected in the middle of the night, then mobile data would be used. We do use Virgin broadband as well. Is there any way that we can tell, after the event, whether the broadband, and therefore the wifi, did disconnect ? (Obviously, no idea as to why it did).

Also, I am not sure whether the forum is the appropriate place to talk about plans, but I note that for very similar fees, my plan allows unlimited calls and 2G of data, whereas my wife's allows 300 mins of calls and 300M of data. And when looking at available plans to switch to, nothing similar to mine appears to be available to her (except at about 3 times the cost). OK, not normally a problem, when the typical usage for each of us is about 10 mins of calls and 50M of data, but it would - in this case, which we accept as being our fault - have avoided her incurring the charge. Is there a reason why she cannot have the same plan as I have ?

Thanks.

[Kath_F]

Hi gunnerdw, 

Thanks for coming back to us on this. 

It wouldn't be possible for us to give you a definitive answer as it will depend on the device and settings you have set up. This can stretch to settings for individual apps too for example I have my Email and WhatsApp settings on to update via data and WiFi so even when sleeping, any new notifications will come through. The data usage could be due to apps updating too. 

It's worth having a look at settings and make sure they are set to WiFi only and this will stop data being used instead. 

In terms of deals, we're not able to help with these I'm afraid. You'd be best off speaking to the team on 150 / 0345 600 0789 and the team there can help 🙂

Let us know if you have any further issues. 

Thanks, 

[enlli]

Don't know what phone you are using but on my Android is you go into Settings / Connections / Data usage using the menus there you can see what the data usage is for each app You can also set a monthly figure for data usage based on the refresh date. Once exceeded the phone will switch off mobile data automatically.

BTW 300Mb of data is nothing these days, data consumption of apps has risen significantly over the years.

[gunnerdw]

Thank you very much, both Kath_F and enlli.

We will scour the settings, and will monitor both of our data usages. And, as you say, Kath_F, we will need to get onto 150 to discuss the plans.

It sems to me that a good way to avoid charges in the future is just to set the cap to zero. We should still get the messages through as the allowance is used up, and can investigate what is using them.

I agree, enlli, that 300M is a very low limit nwadays, but - as I said - I would describe myself as a much heavier user of mobile data (Flashscore keeping up to date with other football matches whilst I am at one) and frequent WhatsApp messages whilst out and about. Much heaver than my wife, yet my monthly usage is about 50M at tops - currentl 12M at two-thirds of the way through this month.

Thanks, again, both of you for your help.

[Matthew_ML]

Hey gunnerdw, thank you for reaching back out.

I will pass the comments onto my colleagues.

Please do let us know how you get on with any new deals. Thanks