Episode 5 Rip Off Britain


Episode 5

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Transcript


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We asked you to tell us what's left you feeling totally ripped off,

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and you've contacted us in your thousands.

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You've told us about the companies that you think get it wrong

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and the customer service that simply is not up to scratch.

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If you're paying for a good service,

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you expect a good service and a good product, whatever it may be.

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At the end of the day, we expect value for money.

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You've asked us to track down the scammers who stole your money

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and investigate the extra charges you'd say are unfair.

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The wool's been pulled over our eyes,

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I don't think we get a fair price.

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I think they should always put the customer first.

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And when you've lost out but no-one else is to blame,

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you've come to us to stop others falling into the same trap.

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And no-one could sort that out for you over ten years? No-one has.

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So, whether it's a blatant rip-off or a genuine mistake, we're here

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to find out why you're out of pocket and what you can do about it.

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Your stories, your money. This is Rip-Off Britain.

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Hello and thanks for joining us once again

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as we get our teeth into quite a mix of really shocking stories today

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that involve all those serious problems with everyday things,

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like phones, bills...

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All the issues that affect pretty much every one of us,

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but which, when something goes wrong,

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can have a really frustrating and soul-destroying impact on our lives.

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And that's certainly true

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with one of the cases we'll be investigating today.

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Imagine discovering you've been overcharged for something

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and not just for a few months or even a year, but for decades.

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You'd definitely want some of your money back, wouldn't you?

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But as we unravel not just that particular story,

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but other cases where people

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have been left feeling totally frustrated with the charges

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or problems they've been saddled with,

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we'll have unmissable tips

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to make sure that you don't find yourself in the same boat.

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Coming up, the homeowners who, without knowing it,

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have been pouring money down the drain for the last three decades.

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Could YOU be doing the same?

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Since at least the 1980s, we've been paying Severn Trent ?60-?70 a year.

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And this is for a service that we are not receiving.

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And why unexpected charges on one of Britain's bestselling phones

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left this family with not-so-smiley faces.

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It was like ?100 and I was like, "Jade, what have you done?"

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Well, I don't know about you,

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but whenever I've bought a new appliance -

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let's say a washing machine or a fridge -

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and I'm almost afraid to confess this,

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I often put all the paperwork to the one side

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and don't bother filling in the form asking me to register my product.

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But it turns out that could be a pretty serious mistake.

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When you buy a new electrical appliance,

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the chances are you too put to one side the forms

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to register your purchase with the manufacturer.

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But that paperwork can be far more important than it looks,

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as Lorraine Ward from Tamworth knows all too well.

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Rewind to October 2012,

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and following the birth of Lorraine's second daughter, Lacey,

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she decided to treat herself to a brand-new tumble dryer

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to help with washing all those baby clothes.

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She came across one by the well-known brand Beko,

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who, over the last 25 years,

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have sold more than 20 million appliances in the UK.

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I'd heard of them before,

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but we'd never had any of their products before.

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But everything seemed to get really good feedback on various websites,

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so I felt trusting enough to buy it.

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Once the tumble dryer arrived,

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Lorraine is quite sure that, as she normally would,

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she DID register her purchase with the manufacturer.

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I've always registered products before.

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The actual paperwork to sell it was just like a little card,

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and it was just a case of just fill your details on the back.

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You could do it online, but at the time it was easier for me

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to stick it in the post.

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After she thought she put the form into the post,

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Lorraine forgot about it and settled into the luxury

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of having the new tumble dryer.

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The amount of clothes babies go through!

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To actually get them washed and then be able to put them

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straight into a tumble dryer and back in a drawer

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within a matter of hours was just fantastic.

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It made our lives so much easier.

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But after barely two and a half months' use,

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Lorraine's dream appliance turned into a nightmare.

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Her husband was using the dryer one Sunday morning

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when there was a sudden and dramatic problem.

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Initially, the electric went off,

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and then he could start smelling sort of burning.

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As Lorraine's husband entered the utility room,

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he was shocked to see flames shooting out of the tumble dryer

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into the rest of the room and straight through into the kitchen.

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He was screaming for me to wake up, and he was passing me the baby

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and trying to get the car seat and my car keys, saying,

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"Get out, get out, the house is on fire".

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The family scrambled to get out,

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as the fire tore through the utility room and kitchen,

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and waited for the fire brigade to arrive.

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When they came, they all sort of jumped out of their van

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and started getting the hoses and everything ready,

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and my husband said to them, "It's the tumble dryer.

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"There's two-foot flames coming out of it."

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The fire completely destroyed the utility room and kitchen,

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and the rest of the house had been filled with smoke

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that damaged most of the family's belongings.

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Going in after, it just looked like something out of a horror movie,

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with completely black walls, ceilings...

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It was really horrible to see after.

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Lorraine had no idea that shortly after she'd bought her dryer,

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that particular model had been recalled

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due to concerns over product safety.

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While she remains convinced that she HAD sent off the form to register

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her product with the manufacturer,

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she hadn't received any recall notice,

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as should normally happen if the company had received her details.

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And although a recall notice was published in the national press,

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Lorraine hadn't seen it, so she simply hadn't known

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that the dryer was potentially dangerous

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and should have been returned.

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We believe it had been recalled

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only a few weeks after we purchased it,

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but we knew absolutely nothing about it at all.

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The impact of the fire was huge.

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With no home insurance for their rented property,

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they were left with nowhere to live.

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But family and friends rallied round to help.

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People were brilliant. They were bringing us bags of clothes.

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Someone brought us a Moses basket for the baby!

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Sorry...

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TEARFULLY: People were bringing bottles, everything,

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cos we'd lost everything.

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After two weeks, the manufacturers, Beko,

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paid for the family's temporary accommodation.

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The company has since paid out around ?20,000

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to cover the uninsured house contents,

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plus a further sum for stress and inconvenience.

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But for Lorraine, none of that

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lessens the impact all of this has had on the family.

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I don't think any amount of money, really, would...replace the fear.

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You know, it doesn't pay for that, it doesn't pay for the effects

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that you're left with after the event.

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Lorraine says her nine-year-old daughter was particularly affected

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by what happened.

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Anything that sounded like an alarm or an unusual noise after that,

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she would panic, she would freeze on the spot.

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I'd always have to explain a new noise

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because it would genuinely frighten her.

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When we contacted Beko, the company told us

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it deeply regrets any incident caused by its appliances,

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all of which meet or exceed UK and European standards

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and that its highest priority is the safety of customers.

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It sincerely apologised to Lorraine,

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saying what happened was down to a third-party component

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used in a small batch of dryers made between May and October 2012.

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Beko explained that when it became aware of the issue,

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it launched swift action, including taking out newspaper adverts

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and contacting customers who had registered their appliance.

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But it said it had no record of Lorraine registering hers.

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The company stress that no products currently on the market

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are affected,

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advising that information on product recalls is available on its website.

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It also pointed out that

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while many manufacturers have launched product recalls

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in recent years, in this case,

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it traced almost 90% of affected dryers,

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significantly better than the industry average of just 10% to 20%.

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But since Lorraine's case,

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millions of tumble dryers made by other manufacturers

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have been the subject of similar safety notices

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because of a risk that they too could catch fire.

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If one of the affected models is in YOUR home,

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that's something that you really do want to know about.

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But campaign group Electrical Safety First

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believes suppliers are not doing enough

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to get the message through.

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The current recall system in the UK is failing consumers.

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Typically, when a manufacturer needs to recall a product,

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they often get about 10% to 20% of those products back,

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which means there are hundreds of thousands of those affected products

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still in people's homes.

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But there are ways to quickly and easily check

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which major safety recalls might apply to you.

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Electrical Safety First has put on its website

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a very handy database of every electrical product

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that's been recalled, back to 2007.

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All you have to do is type in a product name or details

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and it will instantly tell you if it's one that has been recalled.

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We, as consumers, all have a responsibility to take action

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amongst ourselves, which is why we've got a recall checker,

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where people can go to our website

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and simply put a few details in to see if any of the products

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that they have in their home are subject to a recall

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and then that will also tell them what they need to do about that.

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We're also encouraging consumers to register their appliance

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at the My Appliance website that the manufacturers have set up.

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And now, following concerns that the whole recall system is ineffective,

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the Retail Ombudsman has launched a scheme,

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which will register contact details at the point of sale

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when customers buy new appliances.

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So, hopefully, if a fault is discovered,

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you will be told about it

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and experiences like Lorraine's won't happen again.

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It's frightening, you don't buy these things ever expecting

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something like this to happen, and nobody should expect it to happen,

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but, unfortunately, I guess in the rarer cases, it does.

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It is really, really scary.

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Now, until recently, we'd probably have said

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that it was the energy companies that had the most complicated bills,

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but with the regulator, Ofgem, now telling them

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to make their costs easier to understand,

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perhaps the rather dubious honour of having the most complex bills

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and impenetrable charges should pass to the providers

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of yet another essential utility.

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And, in the first instance, that would have to be water.

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Now, if you've never really taken a close look at your water bill,

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well, it may be a very good idea to do it now

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because here's a story about a charge

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that was made by a water company which, in this case,

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turned out to be totally unnecessary.

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This is the village of Crick in Northamptonshire.

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It's a close community, where everyone looks out for one another.

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Hi, Jean! Hi, Jean! All right?

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When there's news, it travels fast

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and currently, there is one topic of conversation on everyone's lips.

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Do you think we shall hear any more about the water?

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Speaking to the Daventry councillor...

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Yeah. ..she seemed a bit optimistic about it.

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The problem started back in the autumn of 2014

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when rumours began that some residents may well have been

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paying unnecessarily for part of their water bill.

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It wasn't long before the whole village

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took an interest in the discussion.

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There should be a liaison

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between the council and the water authorities, really.

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Well, I would have thought so, yeah,

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because we're exhausting all our outlets, really, aren't we?

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We do seem to be, yes.

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Jean Garner has lived in her home for 48 years

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and keeps a close eye on her finances.

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The hydrangeas have come on this week, haven't they?

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They have, yeah.

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I am quite meticulous with bills.

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I check them, I check bank statements

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and I suppose it arises from the days when you had a young family

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and money was tight, and it's something that I've always done

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to make sure that all bills and accounts are correct.

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So Jean was surprised to learn from one of her neighbours

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that, for 30 years, she may have been wrongly billed

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by her provider Severn Trent Water

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for a service that she isn't getting.

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In this village, we pay two lots of water bill -

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we pay Anglia Water for the water supply

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and we pay Severn Trent for wastage,

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and the new neighbours that we were in conversation with

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said that they didn't pay Severn Trent.

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So when we looked into it further,

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we found out that the bill for Severn Trent

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was for stormwater collection.

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Jean, along with 14 other residents on the estate,

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was paying around ?60 a year for this stormwater collection,

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which is a charge levied by water companies

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when their drains filter the rainwater into the sewers.

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But what worried Jean after she'd made further inquiries

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was that some of her neighbours weren't paying this charge at all,

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so she wanted to know why SHE was.

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The neighbours told me, "We don't pay Severn Trent any charges.

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"Our stormwater goes into a soakaway."

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So my neighbour and I,

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we got together and discussed this

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and decided that we shouldn't probably be paying, either.

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So Jean contacted Severn Trent Water and asked them to investigate.

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And an engineer came out and tested the water

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and found that it didn't go into the sewer, it went into a soakaway

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and he said, "You shouldn't be paying any bills to Severn Trent."

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The engineer discovered that when Jean's house was built in the 1960s,

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it had what's called a soakaway installed,

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which means rainwater soaks back into the garden.

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It also means that the water companies

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don't deal with the rainwater,

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so don't need to charge for it,

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which in turn means that Jean had been paying Severn Trent Water

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unnecessarily for the last 30 years.

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Since at least the 1980s, we've been paying Severn Trent ?60-?70 a year.

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And this is for a service that we are not receiving.

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Severn Trent Water explained to us

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that when the water industry was privatised,

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the local authority in Jean's area

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hadn't passed over any sewer records.

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So it simply hadn't known which houses had a soakaway system.

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The water company says it relies on customers themselves

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to pass on this information - a fact which, it points out,

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is included on its water bills.

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But even so, once the company DID know

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it had been overcharging Jean for three decades,

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she was horrified by their initial response.

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They told us that they were only going to refund us six months,

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then they sent us a cheque for ?31 something.

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We felt really aggrieved.

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Severn Trent Water said the rebate was in line

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with guidance from the regulator Ofwat,

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who recommend that, as a minimum,

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rebates should go back to the start of the current year.

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But Jean and her neighbours were so frustrated by the situation,

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they contacted other households on the estate,

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to break it to them that they too could well be paying

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for rainwater drainage when they simply didn't have to.

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And very soon, there were plenty of people with a story to tell.

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It's ?60 a year, isn't it,

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the payment for the removal of surface water?

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What baffled the residents was the difference in the size

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of the refunds that Severn Trent Water was offering.

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They gave me a partial refund. 20-odd quid, I got back.

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Oh, I got more than you! It's not the amount, it's the principle.

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They've been charging us for a service that they have not provided.

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Well, after we got involved in this situation,

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there was some very good news indeed.

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Severn Trent Water have now agreed to backdate these refunds

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for many of the Crick residents to 2003,

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netting Jean a payment of more than ?500.

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And what's more, Ofwat have told us

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that all ten sewage companies in England and Wales

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have now agreed to backdate refund payments

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beyond the current financial year.

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So, it's well worth checking your water bills

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to see if you too have been charged for services you simply don't use.

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Once again, we've opened up our Rip-Off Britain pop-up shop.

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This time it was in Nottingham,

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where our top team of experts was on hand to help with

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as many of your consumer problems as they possibly could.

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And students Josh Bore, Tom Giles and Lee Smith

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came to see legal expert Gary Rycroft about the problems

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they'd had with their rented accommodation.

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Our oven broke, our microwave broke, our fridge-freezer's broken,

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we had mould in the ceilings and on the walls, we needed extractor fans.

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I had loads of mould in my bathroom and they just painted over it.

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They did install an extractor fan eventually

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but the mess they left... It's just not really good enough,

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the solution they've provided, really.

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We've got pigeons living in the lounge.

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It doesn't sound much fun, does it? What could you recommend?

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What I do want to find out more about is this issue

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with the pigeons and the mould.

0:17:230:17:26

There's a potential health issue there, I think.

0:17:260:17:29

In terms of the kitchen mould, we had a lot over our ceiling

0:17:290:17:31

that caused the ceiling roof to actually leak.

0:17:310:17:34

The mould has leaked through the cupboards

0:17:340:17:36

and it's caused them to sag.

0:17:360:17:37

When we contacted them about the cupboards falling off the walls,

0:17:370:17:40

she said it was because we've got too many tins in the cupboards.

0:17:400:17:43

If you think the property's not safe to live in, you can ask

0:17:430:17:46

the local authority to come and look at the property

0:17:460:17:48

and just do an assessment of what's needed to bring it up to scratch.

0:17:480:17:52

And that kind of thing will put pressure on the landlord.

0:17:520:17:55

They have a legal duty to carry out any works of repair

0:17:550:17:59

and maintenance that the local authority insist upon.

0:17:590:18:01

Have you got deposits with her?

0:18:010:18:04

It's about ?300. ?300, yes.

0:18:040:18:06

Between you? ALL: Each.

0:18:060:18:08

There's quite a lot of money at stake.

0:18:080:18:10

The tenancy deposit situation is interesting

0:18:100:18:13

because if she hasn't put it in an authorised

0:18:130:18:16

tenancy deposit scheme, then she isn't entitled to sue you

0:18:160:18:20

for unpaid rent.

0:18:200:18:22

So you do need to find out what the situation is with the deposits

0:18:220:18:26

because she could have shot herself in the foot by not

0:18:260:18:30

following the correct procedure there.

0:18:300:18:32

It means you could put some pressure on your landlord to get

0:18:320:18:35

all of this sorted out. Do let us know how it's all worked out.

0:18:350:18:38

We will, thank you. Thank you.

0:18:380:18:40

Well, thanks for coming in and good luck.

0:18:400:18:42

After filming, the boys acted on Gary's advice and asked

0:18:420:18:45

their landlord for information regarding the deposit scheme.

0:18:450:18:48

Since their enquiry, they've all received their deposit back in full

0:18:480:18:52

and have moved out of the property to somewhere

0:18:520:18:54

they're much happier in.

0:18:540:18:56

61% of us in the UK own one of these - a smartphone.

0:18:590:19:04

Choosing one of them

0:19:040:19:06

and getting yourself on the right tariff can seem pretty complicated.

0:19:060:19:09

The people in our next story settled on a Samsung S4 but little did

0:19:090:19:14

they know that a key setting on the handset would leave them

0:19:140:19:17

with sky-high bills and worse still, both the manufacturer

0:19:170:19:22

and the phone provider knew that the problem existed.

0:19:220:19:25

We're often told that it's good to talk, but many of us

0:19:270:19:31

prefer the convenience of sending a simple text message.

0:19:310:19:34

In 2015, in the UK, we sent a staggering 101 billion of them.

0:19:340:19:40

But some of the people texting on one of the world's most popular

0:19:400:19:43

smartphones have found that those messages have ended up costing

0:19:430:19:46

a lot more than they'd bargained for, thanks to the addition

0:19:460:19:49

of a little extra touch to show how they're feeling.

0:19:490:19:52

Samsung has sold more than 200 million of its Galaxy S phones

0:19:530:19:58

since their launch in 2010 and the Galaxy S4 alone sold more

0:19:580:20:02

than 10 million units in its first month of sale.

0:20:020:20:05

One proud owner is 20-year-old Jade Cochrane.

0:20:060:20:09

She switched to a Galaxy S4 when her old mobile phone contract came

0:20:090:20:13

to an end and she decided she wanted something, well, a bit smarter.

0:20:130:20:17

My phone battery was draining out,

0:20:170:20:20

so I didn't want to be paying money for a phone

0:20:200:20:23

that wasn't working right,

0:20:230:20:25

so I thought it was due for an upgrade.

0:20:250:20:27

All my friends were, like,

0:20:270:20:28

showing me what they can do on their phones and stuff.

0:20:280:20:30

I was like, "I want to do that."

0:20:300:20:32

Jade took out a two-year contract with the provider EE.

0:20:330:20:37

She got her dream phone, 600 minutes of calls

0:20:370:20:40

and unlimited texts, all for ?30.99 a month.

0:20:400:20:44

Every time I go to get a mobile,

0:20:470:20:49

I always make sure I get unlimited texts because I text all the time.

0:20:490:20:54

Luckily for Jade, it's her mum Paula who pays for the phone each month

0:20:540:20:58

from her own bank account.

0:20:580:21:00

I've always been quite happy to pay her bill.

0:21:000:21:02

She's never abused the fact that I pay for it and I pay direct debit.

0:21:020:21:08

She's usually very careful.

0:21:080:21:10

So, it came as a nasty surprise in November 2014

0:21:110:21:14

when Paula received a bill from EE for ?100.92.

0:21:140:21:18

And I was like that. "Jade! What've you done?

0:21:180:21:21

"You must've went over your minutes because it's unlimited texts,

0:21:210:21:25

"so it couldn't have been your texting."

0:21:250:21:27

Baffled as to why the bill was so high,

0:21:270:21:29

Paula called EE for an explanation.

0:21:290:21:31

And she was horrified to be told that the next month's bill

0:21:310:21:34

in December was going to be an even bigger one -

0:21:340:21:36

a whopping ?448.97.

0:21:360:21:40

I was really shocked because I thought, no way,

0:21:400:21:44

for a mobile phone bill? That is absolutely ridiculous.

0:21:440:21:46

EE told Paula that the reason the bills were so high was because

0:21:470:21:51

of the number of picture messages being sent from Jade's phone.

0:21:510:21:55

But Jade didn't think she was sending any.

0:21:550:21:57

I already knew if you sent a picture it did cost money

0:21:570:22:00

so that's why I didn't intend to do that,

0:22:000:22:03

I never sent a picture through a text.

0:22:030:22:06

Paula couldn't understand what was going on.

0:22:080:22:10

How could Jade keep on running up such vast bills

0:22:100:22:13

when she swore blind she wasn't sending any pictures?

0:22:130:22:16

Well, it turned out she was.

0:22:160:22:19

These little things.

0:22:190:22:20

Emoticons.

0:22:200:22:22

And although Jade didn't realise it,

0:22:220:22:23

on the Galaxy S4, they came at a price.

0:22:230:22:26

An emoticon is a little smiley face, or unhappy face.

0:22:260:22:31

We use them in text speak, we use them in instant messaging,

0:22:310:22:33

even in e-mails these days.

0:22:330:22:35

And because we use them all over the place

0:22:350:22:37

we just assume that they're going to be free to send.

0:22:370:22:40

But the problem is when handsets have been turning these emoticons

0:22:400:22:44

into pictures,

0:22:440:22:45

these picture messages aren't included in people's bundles.

0:22:450:22:48

They can cost up to 40 pence per message to send,

0:22:480:22:51

and that's the problem that many people have been experiencing.

0:22:510:22:55

Other handset manufacturers have been implicated, too,

0:22:550:22:58

but Samsung seems to be the main handset

0:22:580:23:00

that people are having issues with.

0:23:000:23:02

And of course it was a Samsung phone behind Jade's bills.

0:23:020:23:06

So every time she sent an emoticon,

0:23:060:23:08

Jade's mobile company would charge her 40 pence per message

0:23:080:23:12

because the phone's default setting

0:23:120:23:14

was to translate these text messages into picture messages.

0:23:140:23:17

Now, Jade and Paula had no idea that these emoticons came at a cost,

0:23:170:23:22

and by the time they found out,

0:23:220:23:23

the Cochrans had already been charged ?943.

0:23:230:23:28

Paula rang EE again to protest,

0:23:280:23:31

and the company offered her ?100 back as a goodwill gesture,

0:23:310:23:35

but Paula refused

0:23:350:23:36

because she wanted to get all the extra charges back.

0:23:360:23:39

I says, "Well, I'm not accepting ?100," I says,

0:23:410:23:43

"because that is a ridiculous," I says,

0:23:430:23:47

"amount of money for a mobile phone bill."

0:23:470:23:50

I know that my mum's obviously hurting by the fact

0:23:500:23:52

that all this money's gone

0:23:520:23:54

and it brought the whole family down, to be honest.

0:23:540:23:57

ENGINE TURNS OVER

0:23:570:23:58

The one piece of good news

0:23:580:24:00

was that when Paula went to visit her local EE store,

0:24:000:24:03

staff reset the phone so that sending emoticons would

0:24:030:24:06

no longer show up as picture messages,

0:24:060:24:08

and therefore preventing Jade from

0:24:080:24:10

racking up more of those extra charges.

0:24:100:24:12

It was a surprisingly simple fix,

0:24:120:24:15

and one that plenty of other Galaxy S4 owners

0:24:150:24:18

may wish they'd known about too,

0:24:180:24:20

because if they'd sent an emoticon on any of these phones

0:24:200:24:24

manufactured before April 2014,

0:24:240:24:26

they'd most likely have been charged

0:24:260:24:28

in exactly the same way as Jade and Paula.

0:24:280:24:31

To stop that,

0:24:310:24:32

all that was needed to be done was to go into the phone settings,

0:24:320:24:36

then click on Input mode,

0:24:360:24:39

and then finally select the Unicode option.

0:24:390:24:42

But for Jade and Paula, that solution came too late,

0:24:420:24:46

and although the problem was now solved,

0:24:460:24:48

because bills are backdated, by the end of the month,

0:24:480:24:51

one final huge bill - this time for over ?253 -

0:24:510:24:55

hit the doormat.

0:24:550:24:56

It shouldn't be allowed,

0:24:560:24:58

and I feel quite...

0:24:580:25:01

I feel as though I've been robbed of my money.

0:25:010:25:03

But when we contacted EE,

0:25:040:25:06

the company pointed out that Paula's monthly itemised bills

0:25:060:25:09

DID highlight the extra charges, making it clear

0:25:090:25:12

they were messages not included in her mobile phone plan.

0:25:120:25:15

EE also told us they'd sent a series of text messages to the phone

0:25:160:25:21

warning the phone usage was higher than usual,

0:25:210:25:23

which could result in higher than normal charges,

0:25:230:25:26

and they stressed it's the handset, not mobile networks like them,

0:25:260:25:31

which converts emoticons into picture messages.

0:25:310:25:34

So they're working with the phone manufacturer Samsung

0:25:340:25:36

to ensure this won't happen automatically in the future.

0:25:360:25:40

And it seems that's been successful,

0:25:400:25:42

because while Samsung reiterated that only phones

0:25:420:25:46

made before April 2014 had been affected by this,

0:25:460:25:49

it also told us that this issue has been fully resolved

0:25:490:25:53

and that now all Samsung smartphones classify emoticons as SMS messages.

0:25:530:25:59

But Jade and Paula remain frustrated

0:26:010:26:03

that they've had to stump up nearly ?1,200

0:26:030:26:06

that, if the phone had been set up differently,

0:26:060:26:08

they would never have had to pay,

0:26:080:26:10

so they hope their story will serve as a cautionary tale,

0:26:100:26:13

to prevent others being caught out by phone charges they didn't expect.

0:26:130:26:17

Read up on your technology.

0:26:170:26:19

If you're going to buy a device, nowadays,

0:26:190:26:21

the technology is getting so advanced,

0:26:210:26:24

make sure you do research on it before you buy it.

0:26:240:26:27

Well, you can't help sympathising with Jade and Paula

0:26:300:26:32

about the money they've lost,

0:26:320:26:34

and if you've got a different phone,

0:26:340:26:35

don't think you don't need to worry about unexpected extra charges.

0:26:350:26:39

There's a whole raft of ways that some smartphones can be...

0:26:390:26:42

shall we say,

0:26:420:26:43

a little too smart for their own good?

0:26:430:26:46

If you have a story that you'd like us to investigate,

0:26:510:26:53

then do get in touch with us via our Facebook page, BBC Rip Off Britain.

0:26:530:26:59

Our website is bbc.co.uk/ripoff Britain.

0:26:590:27:02

Or you can e-mail us at ripoffbritain@bbc.co.uk.

0:27:060:27:10

Or indeed if you want to send us a letter, then our address is...

0:27:100:27:13

It's clear that we can end up feeling short-changed,

0:27:240:27:27

or treated truly unfairly in every aspect of our lives,

0:27:270:27:31

and I must admit,

0:27:310:27:32

I'm really astonished by some of the stories we've heard about today.

0:27:320:27:35

It's actually hard to see how some of the people we heard from

0:27:350:27:38

could have acted any differently.

0:27:380:27:39

I know, it is quite extraordinary, isn't it?

0:27:390:27:41

And yet, they have been stuck paying the price,

0:27:410:27:44

when as far as they were concerned that really should not be the case.

0:27:440:27:48

And the problems that eventually occurred

0:27:480:27:50

really should have been flagged up an awful lot sooner.

0:27:500:27:52

But hopefully, what has happened today is you have picked up

0:27:520:27:55

some really useful advice in case any of the same things

0:27:550:27:58

ever happen to you,

0:27:580:27:59

and if you do find yourself losing out as a result,

0:27:590:28:02

then please do let us know, because maybe it's something

0:28:020:28:05

that we can look into on one of our upcoming programmes.

0:28:050:28:08

And we have plenty of those coming up over the next few months.

0:28:080:28:11

In fact, I'm happy to say our food and holiday series

0:28:110:28:14

will be returning,

0:28:140:28:15

so let us know if there's something on those topics

0:28:150:28:17

that we can look into on your behalf.

0:28:170:28:19

But in the meantime, that's all we've got time for for today.

0:28:190:28:22

Thanks to everyone who shared their stories with us,

0:28:220:28:24

and we'll see you back here very soon to investigate some more.

0:28:240:28:27

Til then, from all of the team, bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

0:28:270:28:30

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