Vodafone eforum:lost/missing mblox post

[El Gringo]

i noticed this while surfing
"I had only 7p left this morning. So I topped up £5 using a topup voucher at 9.07am"
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...G=Search&meta=

http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=7686
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http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:s...lnk&cd=1&gl=uk

Hi
I had only 7p left this morning. So I topped up £5 using a topup voucher at 9.07am. Before I could make my first call I received a text congratulating me on qualifying for free week end texts and calls. My £5 top up credit vanished. I want to know what to do. This fraud first happened in June and I complained at one of the vodafone shops without any relief. They told me that one Mblox Limited was responsible for the fraud. What relief or protection do I get from vodafone?

Originally Posted by philomina

QUOTE (philomina @ Sep 22 2008, 11:50 AM) *
Hi

I had only 7p left this morning. So I topped up £5 using a topup voucher at 9.07am. Before I could make my first call I received a text congratulating me on qualifying for free week end texts and calls. My £5 top up credit vanished. I want to know what to do. This fraud first happened in June and I complained at one of the vodafone shops without any relief. They told me that one Mblox Limited was responsible for the fraud. What relief or protection do I get from vodafone?

It sounds like Mblox Limited have got hold of your details somehow. Have you ever done a tv poll or subscribed to any music or anything else? Did you get a text from anyone other than the one telling you about free weekend text and calls?

Vodafone are not responsible for the money paid out on your phone. They only pay out to the companies who request it.

Personally I would suggest you get a new sim as it sounds like every time you top up you are going to continue to lose the money.

BD (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Originally Posted by Big Dreams

but where is it on their forum?

[Cormoran]

@El Gringo,

I also read this thread yesterday. There was a reply in late afternoon from Mblox denying any fault and passing the blame onto one of its content providers.

Yet again VF eforum has removed a very interesting thread, for what reason?
Do Mblox supply content to their mobile internet sites?

[El Gringo]

http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=5586
Out Of Scope On Your Phone Bill, Anyone know what this means?

Aug 11 2008, 06:37 PM
Due to excess I had an unexpected phone loss although thankfully no one has made any international calls this time. Although there does seem to be 4 blocks on my bill that state £2.50 VAT Out of Scope.

Does anyone know what this means? As it does not have any description on my bill apart from that, no numbers or if I'd used WAP or anything?

I've never seen this on my bill in my life and am wondering what it would be or what has someone used it for if they found my phone before I had it barred?

Originally Posted by Mackle

Aug 12 2008, 10:00 AM
Hi Mackle,

As mentioned above, this will be some kind of purchase or subscription. Have you bought any games, ringtones or music, or maybe even subscribed to a service or entered a competition?

Out Of Scope literally means it's out of the range of items we charge VAT on. As we're just accepting the payment on behalf of another company, they'll charge VAT if necessary.

Thanks,

Tom

eForum Team

Originally Posted by Tom_Vodafone

that sounds complete rubbish.

http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=7620
Random Bill Charge

Sep 20 2008, 07:06 PM
Can an admin please explain why I have a random charge of my bill which is as follows:

Thu 11 Sep 08:25
£3.00 VAT Out of Scope
Where did this come from?

I download all my games, ringtones and wallpaper so I have no reason to and have not purchased anything using this phone on that specific date.

Originally Posted by kolyimmd

Sep 20 2008, 08:10 PM
Hi there Kolyimmd,

Thanks for your post today

I can’t tell you what that charge is without looking into your account, I am certain this isn’t Vodafone being sneaky, this could be a number of things, such as a charge if you don’t have direct debit set up.

I have sent you an email, this way we can deep dive into your account and see what is going on.

Thanks for your patience.

Matt
eForum Team

Originally Posted by Matt_Vodafone

why are Vodafone making it so difficult for their customers to see if they are being scammed

[El Gringo]

customer "£3.00 VAT Out of Scope.........Where did this come from?"
Vodafone "I can’t tell you what that charge is without looking into your account"

it looks like they found the dodgy company that put the charge there

http://online.vodafone.co.uk/dispatc...pageID=MI_0042
Mobile Instant Messenger

If you don’t want the full, always on Vodafone Messenger experience, you can login to mobile friendly versions of your Instant Messenger accounts from the Vodafone live! homepage.
How much does it cost?

It cost just £3 per month to use Vodafone Messenger* - and the first month is FREE.

There are no additional data charges when you use the service. And you can cancel your subscription at any time.

[El Gringo]

ah! the missing mblox post has been restored by Vodafone with an accompanying pr statement

http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=7686
25/9/2008
Hi everyone,

Just to add a note here as it looks like we haven't intervened, we've got philomina's details and are helping in every way we can smile.gif

Tom

eForum Team

Originally Posted by Tom_Vodafone

that's very decent considering it's Vodafone that is responsible for the unauthorized debiting of the account.

[El Gringo]

the "Disappearance Of Topup Credit" vodafone eforum post has been taken down again
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...e+Search&meta=

why don't Vodafone want to talk about the unauthorized debiting of their customers accounts?

[Cormoran]

the "Disappearance Of Topup Credit" vodafone eforum post has been taken down again
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...e+Search&meta=

why don't Vodafone want to talk about the unauthorized debiting of their customers accounts?

Originally Posted by El Gringo

And I've been banned, yet again, after posting a comment on this thread.

Perhaps we have found the VF sore point, the unauthorized debiting of their customers accounts. Is there much more to this than we realize? But as VF know that no one can afford to take this matter to Law we may never know.

[AnthonyC]

I really should be doing more interesting things on a Friday night but this thread is pretty damn interesting in its own way! Love to know what's at the bottom of this mystery!

[mike99]

Funnily enough, I've just had and "interesting" exchange with the people over on the Vodafone forum. (I have not yet decided how much to report, but I'm going to report some of it.)

It started as a perfectly civil exchange. They wanted me to change one of my posts because it contained the word "scam" and implied that certain companies were engaged in fraud - which of course they were and are.

I was happy to do this, because I accepted that my post (while absolutely true in every respect) was libellous; and the libel laws put the onus of proof on the libeller and it it was perfectly possible for me to make the point I was making without directly accusing anyone of "scamming" or fraud.

So far so good.

having changed my post I received this:

I've put your new post in place of the old one, so hopefully this will bring a close to it now! I completely appreciate your points, and we're doing everything we can to make sure these things never happen. Ultimately whenever anyone comes to the eForum with this kind of problem we'll just fix it, so I hope the discussion doesn't continue regarding this closed matter.

Slight note of irritation here! Nonetheless, I did not feel that I could let this go:

I responded:

....... so instead of "fixing" each individual consumer problem as it arises, why not fix the whole problem?

Why not tell the likes of mblox, opera, zamano, tanla, win, etc etc that you will pull the plug on them unless they stop (repeatedly) teaming up with crooked content providers to fleece your customers? These companies are never going to clean up their act in response to PhonePayplus and its token fines and formal reprimands, but Vodafone has got the clout to really influence these companies and hit them where it hurts if they ignore you.

Vodaphone's response:

This isn't an issue I wish to discuss with you.

....... and Vodafone are (relatively speaking) one of the "good guys"

[Cormoran]

''Vodaphone's response: This isn't an issue I wish to discuss with you.''

This is the arrogance that we, the paying customer, has to deal with. Not only from VF but all the networks, when all we are asking is to protect our accounts from fraud. Until there is a change in the law which will allow the police to act on our behalf, I cannot see any change.

[El Gringo]

from recollection this is the question that resulted in the post being deleted.
It was asked by person called 'merton' or '******' or similar

the point they made. in the case of unauthorized debiting.
Vodafone has the billing agreement with Mblox for Vodafone to bill their customers on behalf of mBlox.
In a case where Vodafone has billed their customer's account without authorization why is Vodafone telling their customer to deal with mBblox when their customers have no comercial/customer relationship with mBlox.

The point was made that it was the billing agreement between Vodafone and mBlox that was abused and therefor it should be Vodafone's responsibility to deal with mBlox.

they have been asked this question before and failed to acknowledge it

[Cormoran]

from recollection this is the question that resulted in the post being deleted.
It was asked by person called 'merton' or '******' or similar

the point they made. in the case of unauthorized debiting.
Vodafone has the billing agreement with Mblox for Vodafone to bill their customers on behalf of mBlox.
In a case where Vodafone has billed their customer's account without authorization why is Vodafone telling their customer to deal with mBblox when their customers have no comercial/customer relationship with mBlox.

The point was made that it was the billing agreement between Vodafone and mBlox that was abused and therefor it should be Vodafone's responsibility to deal with mBlox.

they have been asked this question before and failed to acknowledge it

Originally Posted by El Gringo

And the problem with this question is????

Yet again VF have been put on the spot, so as is the norm they refuse to answer and close the thread.

[El Gringo]

interesting. another Vodafone/mBlox post 'hidden/deleted'


"80160 belongs to mBlox - whose CEO Andrew Bud"
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...e+Search&meta=
Text Spam - Vodafone eForum

http://forum.vodafone.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6782
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cach

http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:p...lnk&cd=1&gl=uk

Sep 5 2008, 05:16 PM
I don't know if this has appeared as a topic before as i haven't done a search of the other posts.

On 29/08/08 i received a text from 80160, i did a search online and found that i was to be charged £1.50 for this text, a text that was unsolicited. I called Vodafone and asked how i could stop receiving the texts, i was told to reply STOP to the message or call a premium rate customer care number, i replied STOP.
Today i have received another two texts from 80371. I called Vodafone again and spoke to two different advisors, the first told me to call the premium rate number and ask them to remove my phone number from their list. The second, after me pointing out that this was beginning to get expensive and that there were probably more five digit unsolicited texts going to head my way, said he would bar all premium rate texts to and from my phone. He said he would also send me an e-mail to verify this. So far no e-mail, so it looks like an expensive month for me then.

Originally Posted by MR.LRG

80160 = mBlox Ltd........This service costs £1.50 per text.

80371 = Oxygen8 Communications (Opera Telecom)..........This service costs £1.50 per text.


When Vodafone debits a customers account without the customers authority shouldn't Vodafone be responsible for paying the money back into that account?

Originally Posted by ******

Hi ******,

We look at things on an individual basis before offering to refund charges or not, so I can't give you a straight answer there. For example if we could prove the messages were requested by someone using the phone, we wouldn't offer a refund.

Tom

eForum Team

Originally Posted by Tom_Vodafon

80160 belongs to mBlox - whose CEO Andrew Bud has just resigned from the board of PhonePayPlus (the regulatory body for the premium rate industry) because of "compliance issues".

80371 belongs to Opera (who have just changed their name to "Oxygen8 Communications". They were the firm behind most of the TV based premiums rate scams that hit the news a few months ago. The firm behind the other scams (such as the one on the Richard and Judy show) was Eckoh and the person specifically behind the "competition mechanism" has also recently resigned from the board of PhonePayPlus. [I'm not making any of this up by the way.]

The fact that you have seem to have been scammed by mBlox is par for the course I'm afraid. The fact that you seem to have been scammed by Opera is more surprising - they have been keeping a low profile in the UK since December 2007 - although they have carried on as normal in Ireland, the Caribbean, the USA and other countries.

First thing to do is text "STOP ALL" to any numbers you received this stuff from - though this is often ignored.

If you want you money back, go to phonepayplus and report these two scams. They will tell you how to get in touch with mBlox and Oxygen8 Communications. These firms, in turn, will put you an to the relevant "content providers" who actually design these scams. (Firms like Opera and mBlox simply act as "vehicles" for the "services" - think bank robbers and getaway drivers.)

You will probably have to ring semi-premium rate 087 numbers each time to contact these firms - thereby adding a little bit more to their coffers - but if you are persistent (most people are not) you will probably be refunded.

Of course it could be argued that, since your contract is with Vodafone and they, not you (or so it would seem) chose to do business with there fine upstanding business people, they should refund you instead of making you chase along the "value chain"; but I'm afraid that Vodafone don't like people pointing this out and will probably close this thread now I've said it. (Nothing particular to Vodafone here BTW, all the networks are as bad on this question and at least VF now allo you to bar this stuff and have "vspam", but IMHO there is still a lot more they could and should do.)

Best of luck.

Tom,
Myself, ****** and others are not referring to scams targeting individuals. We are referring to criminals obtaining 'third party' data list of mobile phone numbers and using Mass Marketing technology to target thousands of phone accounts.
.................................................. ...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06...lus_text_spam/
Trading of such lists is thought to be a major factor behind a surge in public complaints over unsolicited text messages.
George Kidd, the regulator's chief executive told El Reg: "We've got to do something about lists and trading. We've got to be able to say to people 'you've bought this list and you shouldn't have'."
.................................................. ...
The issue we are all trying to flag up is the complete lack of protection against the unauthorized debiting of accounts.
To add the problem Vodafone are debiting the Pay As You Go accounts before the victim even receives the unsolicited Premium Rate text.

Originally Posted by ******

@mike99 hmm maybe Mblox has complained about the scam word

[Cormoran]

Does it not seem more than a coincedence that mblox posted a reply on both these threads and both seem to have been censored and removed. (As have I!!!!)

[mike99]

A search for "mblox" on the VF forum now yields nothing. They really really don't wish to discuss this issue.