Faulty iPhone Runs Up £19000 Bill

A man was left stunned after receiving a bill from Orange for £19,000, for using the internet on his iPhone 4S.

Chris Bovis ended up having his phone disconnected, after running up the huge invoice, after the phone had been connecting to the internet without his knowledge.

The bill was run up for data used in October and November 2012. The first invoice had an outstanding amount for £8,097, whilst the next month the amount was even more, at £10,000.

Mr. Bovis said that when he first received the bill, he laughed it off, as his usual monthly charge was just £50 a month. However, when he contacted Orange he was left stunned that they expected him to pay the full amount before his phone would be reconnected.

A visit to the local Apple Store determined that there was a fault with the iPhone, that had been causing it to connect to the internet and transmit large amounts of data. Apple replaced the phone, and Mr. Bovis contacted Orange. To his amazement, despite having proof that the phone was faulty, Orange still expected him to pay a capped amount of £300. Failure to do so, he was told, would result in a visit from a bailiff, and the full amount would be payable.

The problem with Orange was finally resolved, with Orange agreeing to waive the charges, but not before effectively ruining the run-up to Christmas. Said Mr Bovis: “Over Christmas I didn't know if the bailiffs were going to turn up and take everything. My phone bills are normally about £50 and I have never gone over my download limits, so why they did not think something was suspicious beggars belief. Thankfully, when Orange tried to take £19,000 from my bank account the money was not in there and I don't have an overdraft of that amount.”

Orange have now accepted that the issue was due to Mr Bovis' faulty phone, and have apologised, setting the invoice to zero. An Orange spokesman said: “We would like to apologise to Mr Bovis for any distress caused by receiving this unusually high phone bill. It does appear that this resulted from a fault with his device and we are happy to reduce the bill to zero as soon as we have received confirmation of the fault from the manufacturer.”