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Sort it! Stories you would not believe.

'Sort it!' contains a range of true stories from the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO). This publication is a free educational resource for schools and young consumers. It could be a useful tool for you as parents to highlight some of the pitfalls around items such as mobile phones, credit cards, internet use, ATMs, payment arrangements and general issues concerned with consumer decisions. One story refers to Trang who was under 18 when she got her first mobile phone, so her account had been opened in her mother's name. Almost as soon as she got the phone, Trang started receiving premium text messages on her phone that were costing her money to read.

Trang's mother contacted the telephone company and asked for the messages to be stopped. She said that Trang had not asked for these to be sent and should not have to pay for them. When they didn't stop, Trang's mother stopped paying the phone bills and hid the phone. Shortly after this Trang's mother received an overdue notice and a disconnection notice. The phone company was charging an early termination fee of $732.

Trang's mother called the TIO to make a complaint saying that the text messages were still coming 9 months after she asked for them to stop, even though she had locked the phone away.

Solution? Now…..what do you think really happened? The TIO had to investigate the case. The company found that Trang had been billed for three premium text services from three different providers. They provided evidence that Trang had subscribed to all of the services from which she had been sent hundreds of dollars worth of texts, two of them were subscription services and one was an 'on demand' service. 

Result…. The phone company waived all of the charges from one of the companies because she had tried to stop the subscription but sent the wrong stop code. They waived some of the charges for the second one as she had subscribed and unsubscribed a number of times. She was liable for the $8 incurred for the on demand service. Trang's mother's contract was still operating so no cancellation fees would apply however, Trang's mother had to pay $350 still owing on the account.

If you would like to order a free copy of Sort It! You can do that via the publications section of TIO website www.tio.com.au. The website also has some useful information on it, or freecall 1800 062 058 if you would like some advice about a particular issue or perhaps you want to lodge a telecommunications complaint.