More cellular phonebill fun.

[NFG]

Our first month after I was granted a PIN to download cellular phone games cost us nearly $125 CDN.  A lot, considering the amount of our normal bill.  The most recent Dorimaga shows the download fee for Namco's Ridge Racer to cost nearly Y1,100 - Y500 for the basic game, and Y600 for the packet fees, a mere 256kb in this case.  Regular users pay through the nose compared to AU's all-you-can-use 800kb/s service, a mere Y4,000 / month.  That still astonishes me.  

There was an interesting bit on cloned cellular phones on 6ch news tonight, where users are being billed for packet charges they deny are theirs.

In one case a teenaged girl had her phone locked in a drawer for 30 days and still racked up nearly Y20,000 in charges.  The phone company's (Docomo) response?  "Parents today are often unable to tell if their children are lying" and other similarly rude statements.

Another user, carrier unknown, was charged the equivalent of several thousand dollars for a months' packet charges, including a one-hour segment where he allegedly sent over four thousand messages.  The speed typing king or what?

The end result is Japan's first lawsuit against a phone company.  The girl's family is seeking Y60,000 in packet fees to be refunded.  The girl apparently made the choice even knowing it would cost nearly 10x more for the lawsuit, in order to clear her name.  Interestingly Docomo refused to release detailed information on the packet charges.

Lawrence.

[exodus]

wow.

well...I hope they have the money to cover the charges for the suit, and that most importantly, the company is held responsible for it's actions.  Suits like this aren't as common in Japan as they are in the US, I'm guessing??

[davidleeroth]

Just imagine the amount these companies get from people who don't bother reporting small extra fees on their bills.