AFP - 1 hour 34 minutes ago

OTTAWA (AFP) - An oil field worker in western Canada was shocked this month to be charged 85,000 dollars for surfing the Internet on his new mobile phone, local media said Thursday.

Calgary resident Piotr Staniaszek, 22, had signed up for Bell Canada's cellular phone service at about 150 dollars per month, with unlimited mobile Web browsing.

He believed the plan allowed him to use the phone to connect with his computer, using it as a modem to download a lot of data, high-definition movies and other bandwidth-hungry applications.

But when his first bill arrived in the mail, Staniaszek realized to his horror that the company was charging him on a per-kilobyte basis for Internet downloads.

"I didn't know what to think. I thought there was probably a mistake," he told public broadcaster CBC. "I told them I wasn't aware that I would be charged for hooking up my phone to the computer."

A spokesman for Bell said the company will adjust Staniaszek's bill to 3,243 dollars, as "a measure of goodwill."

But Staniaszek said he still plans to try and fight it, "because I didn't know about the extra charges. Nobody explained any of this to me."

"The thing is, they've cut my phone off for being like 100 dollars over," he told CBC News. "Here, I'm 85,000 dollars over and nobody bothered to give me a call and tell me what was going on."

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/afp/20071213/tod-canada-internet-telecom-offbeat-7f81b96_1.html

:eek: geez!

:eek2:

Wow. That's a lot of porn.

I mean movies!

;)

One more reason to hate Bell Canada!

I hate big communications companies PERIOD! (They all assume everyone is as rich as they are, and consider $1000s of dollars as "affordable")

I hate big communications companies PERIOD! (They all assume everyone is as rich as they are, and consider $1000s of dollars as "affordable")

right on!

I hate big communications companies PERIOD! (They all assume everyone is as rich as they are, and consider $1000s of dollars as "affordable")
They're almost as bad as the oil companies. :mad:

LOL - this is like the guy who owned the company I used to work for. He sponsored some Russian tennis player and gave her one of the companies BlackBerries (my old one actually). When I had it, I might make a couple of calls a day or have a couple of incoming ones. No big deal.

When she had it - he was getting phone bills between $4000 - $7000 a MONTH!! :eek:

Apparently during her travels, and while waiting at airports, she was making calls to friends all over the world not thinking about the crazy roaming charges! She ended up having it taken away from her after about 5 months of this nonsense. :lol:

Something like that happened to a friend of mine - he got slapped with a $1k bill and his phone got shut off. Heh.

Just be careful if you decide to do that when you're with Verizon...

I'm glad I don't have Verizon. I've heard tons of horror stories about them. :eek:

I'm glad I don't have Verizon. I've heard tons of horror stories about them. :eek:

Aren't they also in BIG trouble financially or something? eh - maybe why they tried to "slip by" the larger than usual phone bill. hehe

Aren't they also in BIG trouble financially or something? eh - maybe why they tried to "slip by" the larger than usual phone bill. hehe
I think I heard something about that, too. Doesn't surprise me. :rolleyes:

I love how big companies often use the slogan "For just a few dollars a day" , let's see a few is litterally 3...X 365 days, comes out to $1,095 a year ($1,098) on a leap-year.....THEY may think that's not a lot of money but, *I* sure do! :p