paying for Mother's phone but not sure she understands the implications thereof....

[bigmouthstrikesagain]

My Mother is on a tiny fixed income and has no landline, so a mobile is a necessity. She had always used pay as you go sims and I worked out it was eating alot of her income to do so. So I looked into getting a sim only pay monthly tariff and am now paying for her calls on this basis and have been for 7 months.

It was 50 mins and 100 texts for a £5 but I have just called and got a new tariff of 100 mins and 3000(!) texts for a £5. I was prompted to call and change the rate, as her recent bills have been climbing above £30.

Anyhow - I am not sure she is paying much attention to usage she has a tendency to tuck her head in the sand when money is involved and so when the phone was operated on a pay as you go basis she was constrained from using the phone when she had no money. Obviously now these restraints are removed and we are now paying the price.

I don't think it is deliberate and she has just moved to a new flat and I have had some time in hospital and she stayed here for 2 weeks to look after the children so I don't resent her or think she is deliberately taking the p.

BUT she did just text me to say that she had texted to enter a competiion to win £25k - which immediately made me sigh and wonder how much that text cost me [hmmm] - should I keep quiet and be glad that I can help Ma keep in contact and have more disposable cash - or do I need to act like her Mother again and try to get her to be more aware of call charges (which would probably end badly and she would be afraid to use the bloody thing)... arggh

can't you set the account with a cut off? I am sure there is a facility to do this. You set it so the maximum you will pay is £x per month and when it reaches this limit then it is incoming calls only.

Or stop paying her bills for her.

Or carry on paying

Or tell her that you will pay £x amount and no more and she will have to pay for calls over and above that

Limits would probably worry me as a big part of paying for the phone is knowing she can make calls when she needs too. Ach I will probably suck it up.

I just don't want to add to the list of 'things we don't talk about'

You can ask the phone company to stop any texts to 5-digit numbers or any numbers that are not included in the monthly amount. The monthly amount usually covers any landline or mobile phone numbers.

We had this with Tesco. Have had the holes in the contract filled now (hopefully).

Talk to her about call charges - especially stuff like competitions. Can you get an itemised bill and go through it with her? Show her how much of her bill is paying for genuine human contact (via calls and texts) and how much is just wasted.

Thank you for your replies.

I could request some itemised bills maybe that will help. The main problem Piper is that I am hundreds of miles away and so I have fewer opportunities for sitting down with her to go through bills. My sister (her step-daughter) is in the same town and helps her loads with form filling and benefits etc. for which I am eternally grateful but this is not something I would ask her to deal with.

I just know that if I tried to explain things over the phone - my simple and hopefully reasonable explanation/ advice would sound like 'Blah blah blah your are doing it wrong stop using the phone you useless woman blah blah blah...' which is very frustrating but.

If you got her a 3 sim it would work out her getting over 2000 mins a mnth and 5000 text for 15.00 I never understand why people don't shop around for the best tarriff. 3 offers the most minutes for the best price.

Sorry Fabby - I have had nightmare experiences when I was with 3 as their abysmal customer services outweighed the cheap tariff that initially attracted my custom - after many many hours on the phone to 3 'helplines' I vowed they would never get my custom again and the coverage in Mums very rural location narrows the choice a bit. I found a provider that enables me to call her free of charge from my house phone.

but that said I may well look again at the market as the decision to get the sim in the first place was a spur of the moment one and done in a day as Mum was visiting.

Maybe this is something you just have to put up with until you next see her and then tread carefully. What is more important to you in the long run

You sound like a good daughter to have

thank you eaglewings

On O2 favourite place you get 500 free minutes per month to all o2 numbers and landlines so long as you top up 10 pounds each month you also have the tenner to use for texts etc.

Could you not make it sim only and you top phone up via your own bank card ? It an be done, a few cash machines even let you top up. Or you could buy the top up voucher and text her the code ?

You could try the T Mobile one where what she uses is capped? Or if say she only rings 02 numbers get the bolt on if she is on 02 so she can call specific mobiles free of charge, Vodafone do that as an option to for an extra fiver a month you have like a friends and family list and can add up to five people on the same network and call them for free.

Well I think I am going to be resesrching phone deals tonight then - thank you for the pointers.

researching even!

You can put a spending cap on that is separate to the inclusive minutes. If you are sure she has more than enough inclusive minutes for the month than put a cap on and she will be prevented from doing things like calling 0845 numbers or texting competitions once the cap is reached, but she will still have use of the inclusive minutes.

Gosh that sounds complicted Eric (he is mine btw ) - but probably a good idea.

Anyhoo I have been doing some back of the envelope calculations and have decided to hold off on any further action until Ma has spent a month on her new tariff I have got her on 100m for a fiver and as it seems she was only doing around 100 mins anyway that should cover it - there is no point in paying for 2000 mins she will never use (and I couldn't see that deal on 3 anyway but maybe I was looking in the wrong place).

So if she does need more I will review then.

She will hate having to change sim again so I will hold off if poss.

Thank you for all input as it has really helped me focus and look for solutions instead of just dwelling on Mothers faults which is pointless and negative - so thank you and cheers!

I've payed for someone's phone bill before... Never again.