My excitement knew no bounds, when my I received my brand new dream mobile phone, Samsung Galaxy S8 plus. A pretty expensive mobile device, but one in which you'll not be dissapointed. So, while trying to get used to the mobile device, about a month ago, all passwords to my steemit account were erased from my protonmail account, an encrypted email, where some of my data are stored. That disaster was averted. Thanks to steemconnect. The next major challenge I have to deal with now is that of having to pay 6 times my usual telephone bill. Now, that really sucks!
How I Incurred Unexpected $84 Telephone Bill
For prepaid subscribers, don't bother about this issue that I'm writing about. However, postpaid subscribers should please, pay attention to this. When you buy a new phone, make sure to check all of the features and be sure that you do not making any mistake to touch a button that will 'drain your wallet'.
At the moment, I am far away from home, but always keep in touch. Communication with my family is done through whatsapp, skype or any good voice over IP (VOIP) service, since it is a lot cheaper for me to call that way. I think it was my mum I called that day and we had a long chat (as always). Little did I know that I had mistakenly called using my direct telenor line. After a couple of days of making that call, I received a message from telenor informing me that I had spent a lot more than I usually spend. That was a little shocking to me. Curiously, I quickly dialled *311# to check. What did I see? A whooping sum of over 8,000 RSD (8,491.30RSD /~$84) waiting to be paid.
Hmm...the speed with which I got to telenor office that day can only be better experienced than imagined. When I got there, they checked and discovered that there was an international call that was made to Nigeria. The cost for that call alone was over 5,000 RSD (~ $50). How would I be paying 6 months telephone bill for just 1 month? For the monthly subscription packet which I am on, Telenor Play + 20, all calls, sms and internet are unlimited and the cost is 1,436 RSD /month (~$14), under normal circumstances.
I have written to telenor customer care or relklamacija as it is called here to see if anything can be done about it, otherwise the bill waiting to be paid is still
Lesson learnt: Never use a new phone to make international calls, until you become familiar with it.
Have you ever experienced a situation where you incurred telephone bills which you never budgeted for? Please, share in the comment section.
All images are original screen shots captured with my Samsung Galaxy S8 mobile phone, except image 1 from shutterstock.