Cell Phone Bill Charges, What The?
Written by Confusion support on May 22, 2008 – 11:25 am -
A confused reader sent this in: My cell phone bill confuses me. I generally just pay what it says, but every so often when the total looks suspicious, I’m given to attempting to decipher the 15 to 20 pages that lay out all the charges that I and my children (I have a family plan) have accrued. After about 10 minutes or so of perusing the document, I’m usually back to simply paying what it says.
First, I can’t seem to keep the pages straight. As soon as I flip one, I’ve completely lost its context, and putting it back in place is akin to doing a jigsaw puzzle or perhaps even a “Rubik’s Cube” if I’ve flipped more than one page. I can only imagine what might happen if I ever dropped the thing.
Second, as I scan the calls, I notice that some have a charge against them while others do not, but there seems to be no pattern involved. It’s almost as if there is some formula they apply that randomly determines which calls are included in your base plan and which aren’t. I once called the customer service department about this (and T-Mobile customer service actually is very accommodating), and they couldn’t explain it either.
Third, there’s occasionally a charge for some premium service. Naturally, when I question my kids about such, they have no idea what I could be referring to. All they ever do is text, they claim (fortunately I have an unlimited texting plan, or I’d be in real trouble deciphering the bill - and paying it). I personally use my phone once every couple of weeks - I’m not very popular - and I couldn’t figure out how to access a premium service if my life depended on it, so I’m certain I don’t order them. I did have some premium services removed once (after having to pay for them for the current billing period), but no one could tell me how they got there in the first place. I suspect the phone company tries to slip them by us every so often, realizing that most, like me, are too intimidated by the bill to investigate.
And finally, there are the numerous taxes and regulatory charges that get applied. Do we really need to pay both taxes and regulation fees? I have to wonder what such fees are actually being applied to. Certainly they aren’t going toward getting us better reception.
It sure would be nice to know how much the cell phone company is actually making off of me and my blissful ignorance. Or perhaps ignorance really is bliss, even if it does cause some confusion on occasion.
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