What happened: within the last days I started getting SMS from 624 advertising different "products". I did nothing to get these messages. No subscription, nothing. So I downloaded an application from android store to block the unwanted messages.
A few days later I get an SMS from Sunrise stating that I have current Sms costs of about 50chf. Logging into my sunris acount I see that getting sms from this company costs about 5chf/sms.
I call sunrise, they seem to know the issue, but saying that I should pay the money because I am guilty of not blocking the premium sms. The well known friendly customer service from sunrise. After raising the voice and a conversation of about 30 minutes they promise to cancel the costs.
Now, it's not only about the money. My conclusion is that sunrise knows very well what they do. They have contracts with these dubious "premium" service providers. They even have a procedure for customers calling and complaining. Without insisting i should have ended up with an invoice containing the costs.
Is Yallo a subsidiary of Sunrise? Checked wiki and it is.
Two years ago I bought a Yallo pre-pay sim card. I ordered from the official yallo website. The sim card was not free, and when I got the card it already contained 20 CHF credits.
Then, as soon as I put the card into the phone, I received some premium sms (mainly introducing hot girls), and the credit ran out in one minute before I could do anything (The became even -10, meaning that I would have to recharge at least 10 CHF to make it above zero before I could use the sim card).
I was very unhappy and called the customer service immediately. They acknowledged that. But they said that this was not their fault. It was due to the fact that the previous user of this phone number had been subscribed to this service. I insisted that this was not an acceptable excuse to give a brand-new customer a "new" sim card subscribed to premium service. After I insisted they agreed to credit me back the money, but they said I need to send the printed version of the sms history... blablabla. Finally I found it was so complicated for the 30 CHF I lost so I gave up and threw away the card.
Probably sunrise hired the yallo product manager for "premium" services. Reading further your description, probably sunrise hired the process manager for customer services, too.
We're having the same issue with Orange. Am so glad we only signed up for one year. As soon as its over we'll move to Swisscom. Never, ever had any issues like this with them.
A sunrise guy knocked on my door and said he was from Sunrise and had come about my Internet connection.
I said I didn't have Sunrise Internet.
He said, he knows, but he's just checking the technical status of connections for the inventory, so could he take a quick look.
So I let him in and showed him where my modem plugs in. His look was really cursory. I'm sure he didn't look well enough to actually yes anything.
The he said he was going through the house for the landlord, and they're switching our Internet from Cablecom to Sunrise. All I have to do is sign this letter of cancellation here, and sign up for Sunrise here. He took out some statistics and showed that overall, with everything combined (TV, Internet, Phone) I was going to save 11 Francs a month.
I said, I didn't want to save that money, and if my landlord was doing something like that, I'm sure I'd know, and would he please leave. He then started getting quite rude and I finally had to show him the door.
Sunrise must be getting really desperate if that is their selling tactic now.
Imagine that visa/mastercard credit card provider gives your credit card number and address to some "premium" provider, the "premium" provider provides you with the "premium" service and sends the bill to the credit card company. Which in turn bills you.
In order to make it seem legal, they don't do in the open. They use a backdoor in your smartphone, called WAP-Billing or a similar one.
Sunrise is playing the middleman in a scam. Btw, I am not convinced you have to click anything in order to activate the backdoor. It might be enough that the "premium" provider has your telephone number.
Just wanted to add to the discussion as I`ve recently had the same issue with Sunrise Premium SMS. In summary, I was charged 120CHF for premium SMS & am waiting for sunrise to send a new bill with these charges REMOVED.
I have NEVER registered, clicked on or open any dubious links on my phone. As if by random last week I was bombarded with 30+ SMS in under 20 minutes, all for pornography. I did not open any links. Finally a sunrise SMS warned I had gone over 100 CHF in Premium SMS for the month. I was shocked & called customer service who told me Premium SMS has now been blocked BUT that the only way to get my money back was to call or write to the company who had sent the premium text.
In the meantime, I received my sunrise bill - 120 CHF for the texts. I was furious. A quick forum search came up with a very helpful site (albeit in German, sorry for those who can`t read German but worth asking someone to translate if you are having the same issues).
I found out that others were also targeted and that those who pressed sunrise customer service generally got their premium sms bill refunded. However, for those who did not press sunrise (like me last week), they were told to write to the company (the company of course telling each victim that they had indeed clicked on the links & therefore accepted the charges).
Furthermore, what really frustrated me was that sunrise turned out to have dirty hands in this game - a search on their website came up with this company (VASCOM) as their PARTNER! Therefore I suspect that sunrise is getting kickbacks in this game.
Unbelievable that something like this is allowed and hasn`t been picked up by an ombudsman.
Therefore, if you happen to have the same issue - do NOT pay up, pressure them into refunding or removing the premium sms from your bill. Good luck.
Sort of. In order for VASCOM to bill via sunrise, they have to be partners of sunrise, and sunrise (unsurprisingly) take their cut. They're only partners in that sense.
Think about it - how else could it work?
Of course, sunrise should be filtering out scammers, but in my opinion they are not doing enough.
Yes completly libellous!! sunrise do not sign people up to premium SMS's, nor do they send people round to lie about your broadband!! these are scam companies / rouge emplyees (not working for sunrise, but resellers) who are just trying to get the commission for signing you up
its quite simple, rouge comany buys a sunrise prepaid phone then just 'signs up' all the number following the number they just bought
eg they buy 071234567 they sign up 071234568, 0171234569 etc etc its happened since the dawn of premuim rate, you just got unlucky, happens just about everywhere, block premium sms's via there website and you won't have an issue
the moblie phone insurance companies do the same thing and will also tell you they are your phone provider, when they are not.
eta could also have been a dodgy app on your phone signed you up, or a friend doing it for a laugh, customer services would have heard the 'I didn't sign up to it' excuse a million times for high phone bills
(If this scam is the same one that was around a few years ago), my OH was able to block these numbers after the event occurred (different company though). I think there is an Ombudsman for communications that may be worth contacting over this...