Traveler Gets $143,000 in Roaming Charges After Overseas Trip

An Apple iPhone Control Panel showing T-Mobile 5G service
A T-Mobile USA customer was stunned to find a bill for $143,000 in roaming charges after he and his partner toured Switzerland in September.
Rene Remund is a frequent traveler and has been a T-Mobile customer for almost 30 years, according to an ABC news report.  He said he always notifies the couple’s mobile operator before leaving the United States and, in this case, stopped by a local T-Mobile store to share his travel plans.
The ginormous bill reflected approximate 9.5 gigabytes of data usage on a smartphone that had apparently not been properly set up for international roaming.
Remund then called T-Mobile and asked that the charges be reviewed. The customer service representative informed him that the bill was not a mistake, that his device had not been set up for international roaming, and that he was liable for the charges.
His reply? “You’re kidding me?”
The hapless smartphone user engaged legal representation and the lawyer then reached out to the local consumer reporter at ABC affiliate WTFS.  The reporter contacted T-Mobile and the mobile operator then offered to credit Remund the full amount.
In a statement without admitting that the personnel in the T-Mobile store might have made an error, T-Mobile told ABC: “We recommend our customers check the travel features of their plan, such as international data roaming, before departing … if a customer is on an older plan that doesn’t include international roaming for data and calling, they’ll need to make sure they’re using airplane mode and Wi-Fi when using data to be certain the device doesn’t connect to an international network.”
(Photo: Accura Media Group)