WHAT AN IDEA: Apps like Facebook and Twitter may get updated and billed even without usage

Ashish Bhatia, a Delhi-based technology columnist, expected to get a hefty mobile bill after a short trip abroad. But what flummoxed him was that the simple action of checking his mail on his iPhone had cost him Rs 1,200. This despite the fact that he did not open the mail, but merely read their subject lines. “I couldn’t browse the Internet for a whole day and I thought of checking my inbox on my iPhone. I switched on my ‘data roaming’ option and that turned out to be my undoing,” says Bhatia.

We all know that international call charges are high. What many of us are not aware of is that data roaming charges — surfing the Net or even checking your emails on your smart phone — can be prohibitively expensive. Unfortunately, more often than not, the first time you discover this is when you are slapped with a huge bill for using these services while abroad.

Even mobile companies concede that it is not uncommon for consumers with smart phones like iPhone, BlackBerry and so on to be landed with hefty bills after a trip in a foreign country.

Unlike calls and SMSes, which get charged only when the mobile phone is being used in a foreign country, smart phones can burn a hole in your pocket even when you are not using them. For instance, some phones with apps like mails, news, maps, Facebook and Twitter accounts get automatically updated, resulting in them being billed even when the consumer hasn’t used these services. As Bhatia points out, “Even updates on one’s Facebook page is treated as consumption of data bandwidth and get charged automatically. While some smart phones have their auto data downloads switched off, that’s not the case with all phones.”

Anil Prakash, Telecom Users Group of India (TUGI), a Delhi-based consumer advocacy organisation, reveals that scores of telecom users face this problem every day. “Travelling abroad with a smart phone is not a very smart idea unless the consumer has taken all the precautions,” says Prakash.

No matter what one’s monthly subscription data package plan is within the country, everything goes haywire once a person goes abroad. “The consumer is completely at the mercy of the local operator in the visited country,” says Prakash.

Another problem according to consumer groups is that billing for data downloads is not uniform around the world. “Home telecom operators go by what the visited country’s telecom operators charge for data roaming and this varies from country to country. Even our own telecom operators sometimes don’t understand the billing practices of foreign companies,” reveals Prakash.

Going by the international data roaming calculator of a major Indian telecom operator, if someone uses his smart phone with an Indian SIM card to browse the Internet in the US, opening three webpages that are not mobile friendly could add Rs 500 to his bill and uploading two pictures onto one’s Facebook page could also cost as much. Using global positioning system (GPS) and other services could cost even more. Opening a mail on your phone in the US could cost approximately Rs 25, but if you open a mail attachment, you could end up paying an additional Rs 500.

“In order to avoid these roaming bill shocks, it is important to understand how smart phones work,” says Rajiv Bawa, executive vice-president, corporate affairs, Uninor. According to Bawa, most smart phones like BlackBerry and iPhone compress email transactions to “a very efficient degree” as email headlines and email messages are counted in kilobytes.

“However, opening email attachments can result in transactions being counted in megabytes. So attachments should be retrieved only if one is in a Wi-Fi zone. Likewise, one should download pictures from social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook only when the smartphone accesses a Wi-Fi zone,” says Bawa.

This is because you do not get billed for data downloads when you are in a Wi-Fi hotspot — although some Wi-Fi hotspots do charge customers who avail of the facility. Phones like BlackBerry have apps that list thousands of free Wi-Fi zones in several cities across the world.

To help mobile users, the European Union has introduced a “cut-off mechanism”, which allows consumers to select a “cut-off limit” for international roaming. It is mandatory for operators to inform customers about data roaming charges through an SMS and also alert them when they cross 80 per cent of the agreed limit.

“What the EU has done is really great. We should have a system like this around the world,” says Bhatia.

Consumer organisations in India complain that while telecom operators maintain a credit limit for customers within the country, the rule is not applied when on international roaming — even if the credit limit has been overshot many times over. “There can be only one reason for this. The telecom companies know that if a consumer is able to go abroad, he can pay the hefty bill as well,” says Col S.N. Aggarwal, a Delhi-based telecom consumer activist.

Of course, the telecom companies claim to have a far more noble objective. They call it a “service gesture” and say that their intention is not to disturb the telecom access of a customer when he or she is abroad, even if the credit limit is crossed.

Prakash of TUGI and others have approached the Telecom Disputes Settlement & Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) against the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India and telecom companies against high international roaming rates. But Prakash does not think roaming tariff rates will come down anytime soon. “People coming from other countries to India also pay exorbitant charges for data usage, and unless there is an international agreement on data roaming, consumers will continue to be at the receiving end.”

Smart moves

■ Check international data roaming charges with your local operator before going on a foreign trip

■ Find out if there are data roaming charges when using your smart phone in a Wi-Fi zone

■ Turn off automatic ‘data download’ on your phone

■ Do not open attachments in a non-Wi-Fi zone

■ Avoid browsing the Net on your smart phone while travelling abroad.