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I’m ready to quit my iPhone 3G

I’ve been on prepaid since I got a mobile phone ten years ago. The only time I was convince to get into a postpaid plan was when I got an iPhone 3G subscription plan from Globe. And for the last 12 months, I thought it was well worth it.

Not until this month when I got my last bill. I’m subscribed on the basic iPhone Plan 1599 and ever since I had it, I never once exceeded my monthly allocation. I don’t text a lot or make calls (and I have 2 other active prepaid numbers) and despite being a heavy mobile internet user, I still am not able to consume all the 40 hours a month allocation (mainly because I got wifi at home and have both SmartBro and Globe Tattoo accounts).

iphone 3g

So it was a huge surprise to learn that last month, my bill went beyond Php6,000 (there’s another Php3,700 spill-over internet charges for this month). During that time, I actually monitor my account getting charged about Php400 every day. So I reported it, made screenshots, documented and asked some clarifications. I got a lot of possible answers:

  • Push Email was set to ON and the iPhone could be connecting to 3G all the time. In the last 12 months of having GMail and Yahoo on my iPhone, I never set it to ON and it’s OFF until now. Fetch is also set to OFF/Manual.
  • iPhone Apps that connect to the net in the background. Been regularly downloading new apps (including Yahoo Messenger, TruPhone and Skype). I thought no iPhone Apps can run in the background? Apple specifically disabled this feature as it hogs resources, battery life and slows down performance. I don’t think there’s an app that runs on the background. To be sure, I restarted/rebooted the iPhone several times during the day.
  • iPhone OS 3.0 reset some settings/configurations. However, I did the upgrade in June so I should have experienced this problem much earlier.

The timing is also suspicious as at least 2 other friends on an iPhone plan have racked up Php17,000 and Php20,000 on their bills this same month. I’ve already filed a dispute/report and so have my other friends.

This isn’t the first time this type of incident has happened. I’ve actually helped a couple of people (both on iPhone and Nokia phones) resolve their sky-high 3G internet charges before.

The quick-fix — disable the APN. That way, the iPhone won’t be able to connect even if it tried to.

It’s irritating though that I need to edit my APN every time I want to connect online. It ruins the experience. Now, I’m always afraid to use my iPhone to connect online. If that’s the case, the iPhone looks crippled — might as well ditch it. Apple needs to look into this.

My only gripe si that I only have a Php2,500 credit limit. I assume that when I reach that amount/charge before end of the month, my account gets suspended, which it should be. So, I wonder why my fees go way beyond Php2,500.

My solution?

  • Switch to Globe Prepaid. But that doesn’t solve the problem that my credits/load could get drained overnight.
  • Jailbreak the iPhone and use my other existing Smart Prepaid SIM.
  • Sell the iPhone 3G and get an openline HTC Magic or Nokia E72 for my Globe subscription.

But before that, I need to settle my unpaid and long-overdue bills first. :D

React to this article:
Abe Olandres
Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.
  • 140 Comments

  1. 🥈 Silver🏆1

    That’s sad. On prepaid one has to simply not load the phone anymore in case your credits ran out mysteriously. You may only lose some 300 pesos or so, than be unaware that your phone has been racking up those charges even while you’re asleep.

    I hope your provider could settle this issue.



  2. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    i have an officemate who has the same issue with his postpaid bill. and he’s also using an iPhone. so basically it’s a problem with the iphone or with subscriber? haha



  4. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    iphone is more an internet browser, i suggest that u subscribe to unlimited internet plan from sun, remove the sim from the modem and stick it to your iphone- there you have it, unlimited internet anytime anywhere minus the worry. For 799 php a month its a very good deal, u can set push email to On and you wouldnt have to worry about charges ever again plus you’ll be literally online 24/7.
    Downside- you cant use your phone to make phonecalls and text messaging.



  5. 🏅 Newbie🏆2

    Grabe nga kaya maski singko nirereklamo ko talaga ang postpaid. Grabe talaga ito.

    Someone has to file a class action. You said you know friends with the same problem. It may be well worth it Abe, especially since you’re tech savvy and have a name in the tech world. Gather some people, get a sympathetic attorney who won’t charge you a house to get him on retainer–there may be a couple–and sue them. You said you have documentary (screenshot) proofs, too.



  6. 💠 Supremacy🏆1

    Ouch. And I thought the erroneous billing on the iPhone was unique to AT&T in the US.



  9. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    yuga cover mo nmn mga bagong ipod..karerelease lng knina..hehe..



  10. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    I had the same experience before with my jailbroken 1st gen while browsing on Smart. The phone froze and after several reset attempts I got the phone running again but by then I missed to manually remove the APN. The apps were happy to download all they can and sent my bill to the roof. Stayed with WiFi after that.



  11. 🥉 Bronze🏆1

    lol….

    i got a 200K+ (Yes with a K!) bill a few months ago – it took a while to get this settled due to their pesky internet system. what i hate about this is it was found out before i was actually billed and it took them a month or so to get the dispute fix



  12. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    i’m also planning to sell my iphone 3G my unpaid bills went to whooping Php 20,000



  13. 🥇 Gold🏆1

    This problem is unique to the iPhone only. This never happens to other phone brands I know.



  14. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    30,000 a month for our iPhone subscription plan.



  15. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    That’s a lot of bill. No pun intended, and am sorry that you’ve been through this. So this is called a Smartphone? “Shrewdphone” would be more like it. We’ve heard of this thing exploding in people’s faces, but it could also send them to the poorhouse?

    Now that’s one thing to really loathe this device.



  16. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    OMG i tought i was the only one having this issue. My bill got 9k! and im only on a plan 500! but now i turned off my APN and delete all settings. and my push notifications was turned off from the start.



  17. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    yikes. plan ko pa naman to avail one sa globe dahil postpaid user ako. ayoko na ng iphone. ipod touch na lang siguro. sana ma-ugrade na like the nano na me camera na ngaun. i’d prefer a faster processor though kahit wala ng cam.

    tapos puro samsung na lang ang celfones ko. maingat naman ako sa gamit kaya kahit cheap di madaling masira.



  18. 🥉 Rookie🏆3

    @ardz – I have a friend who has a Nokia E51 that bumped into the same problem before.



  19. 🥉 Rookie🏆3

    @brianb – one of my friend who had the same problem is a lawyer and he told me he’s preparing a lawsuit or something.



  20. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    Ang problema ay nasa Globe. Kahit naman anong plan ka, you will exceed their limits kasi dadayain ka ng Globe. I have an iPhone (here in Canada) and I monitor my usage closely as well and so far, hindi pa naman ako lumalampas at hindi naman ako nagkakaroon ng outrageous bill. Totoo na laging naka-on ang internet ng iPhone at yun talaga ang feature ng phone and I think Apple doesn’t need to fix this feature kasi yun ang selling point ng iPhone, not it being just another touch phone.

    I suggest you file a suit against Globe for the bill that you shouldn’t be receiving kung within the limits ka naman.

    It’s sad how people are blaming Apple for something that they do not control – cellular billing. They made the phone, not the plan. The cellular companies dictate how they bill their customers, not Apple. These cellular companies know exactly what the phone does and it is their responsibility to inform their customers of how the phone works and what charges may incur with using the phone.



  21. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    Just wanna share the same sentinements with you guys.

    My bill for this month summed up to 13k, 11k for the internet usage. I thought of ditching my iPhone but later realized that I can’t live without it. Hehehehe

    As what Sir Abe did, I manually deleted APN in the phone.



  22. 💠 Supremacy🏆2

    ganun ba ang postpaid ng globe? sa smart post paid merong credit limit (my plan 500 has a 1,300 credit limit) so once you go above, putol agad ang line mo. at least pag may problem sa phone na hindi mo alam, hindi ka nman aabot sa 20k billing.



  23. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    i never did like the iphone…pa – elitista ,there are better phones out there…



  24. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    There are plenty of reasons to ditch the iPhone as you are supporting a device and system that is working against our interests.

    1) Massive violations of consumer rights and excess of corporate greed and control: http://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/5-reasons-to-avoid-iphone-3g

    2) Censorship and unfair app blocking: http://daringfireball.net/2009/08/ninjawords, http://www.informationweek.com/news/personal_tech/iphone/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=219100331, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/05/AR2009050*****7.html, a thousand more.

    3) Apple’s system gives other corporate abusers the right to do whatever they want to you: http://iphone.click2creation.com/2009/04/mobile-carriers-seek-to-block-skype-on-iphone-blackberry/, http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/27/apple-is-growing-rotten-to-the-core-and-its-likely-atts-fault/, etc

    4) iTunes is evil, do I even need links for this? We all know it and know how to use a search engine. Anti-competitive, anti-privacy, anti-anything good for you as a consumer.

    I know we are all selfish people, just looking for the fanciest gadget but we must also think of the larger context and the future of technology. Its ok for 16 year old girls to have daddy buy them the trendy iPhone to match their purse, but as grown adults, shouldn’t we be thinking and making smart adult choices, not as if we were spoiled teenage girls?

    The worst is why don’t you do a poll here, Yuga? How many people own an iPhone and are making less than PHP200,000 a month? Maybe putting it and their overcharged postpaid bill caused by twitter pooling on a credit card?

    I know we all secretly want to be Americans, but there is a reason America and Americans are going broke and loosing all their freedoms to their corporate masters. Maybe we can choose a better path for ourselves than following the “American way”?

    After all, we can now see where that takes them right? Iphone in hand, big screen LCD in every bedroom and a mountain of debt that their children will be paying off, dying of poisonous food courtesy of big corn with no medical care because of a preexisting condition and their children’s health at the mercy of the corporate master that employs them, and yet no freedom to install even a small dictionary like ninjawords on their phone.

    An iPhone, really?



  25. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    There are plenty of reasons to ditch the iPhone as you are supporting a device and system that is working against our interests.

    1) Massive violations of consumer rights and excess of corporate greed and control:

    2) Censorship and unfair app blocking: , , , a thousand more.

    3) Apple’s system gives other corporate abusers the right to do whatever they want to you: , , etc

    4) iTunes is evil, do I even need links for this? We all know it and know how to use a search engine. Anti-competitive, anti-privacy, anti-anything good for you as a consumer.

    I know we are all selfish people, just looking for the fanciest gadget but we must also think of the larger context and the future of technology. Its ok for 16 year old girls to have daddy buy them the trendy iPhone to match their purse, but as grown adults, shouldn’t we be thinking and making smart adult choices, not as if we were spoiled teenage girls?

    The worst is why don’t you do a poll here, Yuga? How many people own an iPhone and are making less than PHP200,000 a month? Maybe putting it and their overcharged postpaid bill caused by twitter pooling on a credit card?

    I know we all secretly want to be Americans, but there is a reason America and Americans are going broke and loosing all their freedoms to their corporate masters. Maybe we can choose a better path for ourselves than following the “American way”?

    After all, we can now see where that takes them right? Iphone in hand, big screen LCD in every bedroom and a mountain of debt that their children will be paying off, dying of poisonous food courtesy of big corn with no medical care because of a preexisting condition and their children’s health at the mercy of the corporate master that employs them, and yet no freedom to install even a small dictionary like ninjawords on their phone.

    An iPhone, really?



  26. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    mismong si sir abe sumusuko sa iphone! rakenrol! kawawang iphone. down with globe postpaid! haha!



  27. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    well…
    user and gadgets not compatible.
    high tech gadgets with a low tech mind user.

    better subscribe to unlimited plans.
    and off all the internet settings and auto.

    Smartphone like Apple iPhone 3G should be use only for smart people!

    peace!



  28. 🥈 Silver🏆1

    don’t blame globe they’re not at fault here
    iphone is the culprit.

    I think you can only blame globe on their bill-monitoring part, they should have detected this irregularity.

    But if I remember it correctly my globe handyphone’s outgoing communication (call/sms) gets barred whenever I hit my credit limit. So why this didn’t kick in?



  29. 🥈 Silver🏆1

    @thinkGuy

    so you’re saying yuga is not smart???

    the problem was the update it enabled lots of services that were previously disabled or unavailable on the old firmware

    I think for whatever reason they were just misinformed. I also didn’t read all the write-ups about 3.0

    peace



  30. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    Kung yung simpleng setting ng Nokia or any user-friendly na cellphone eh hirap na hirap ng gamitin ang subscriber what more kung gumamit siya ng iphone. Some people kasi nag-aambisyon na mag-iphone para lang masabing naka-iphone siya keber na di naman pala marunong gumamit (and take note di naman pala marunong mag-internet wtf ano pa ang silbi ng iphone, pang-call and text lang?!?). tama nga yung sinabi ni thinkGuy na “Smartphone like Apple iPhone 3G should be use only for smart people!” haha natatawa lang ako…



  31. 🥉 Bronze🏆1

    Sir Yuga,

    You might have had your Push E-mail and Fetch set to off but if you have your “Notifications” and “Location Services” on, I think they do run in the background especially if your have messengers and location-based applications running. There are also apps (especially games and tools) that run ads that connects to the internet on the background. That’s why I seldom let kids play with my phone.

    Hopefully I won’t experience that same nasty bump on my bills after having been a happy iPhone-user/Globe subcriber for months/years.

    Good luck on your filing of dispute sir.



  32. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    try editing the mms and apn settings in network settings.

    just add a letter to the globe address and edge and gprs stops logging on the net!

    tried that one and it worked for me. of course I also had to ask globe to recall my really high internet charges

    hope this helps!

    francis



  33. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    sir Yuga, sad to hear that you are terminating your iphone 3G plan with Globe. will you try switching to their iphone 3Gs plan? i applied for plan 399,cash out a bit for the 8 Gb and subscribed to Duo. so far i haven’t had any problems on my Globe iphone 3Gs bill. i had a problem on their billing way back 2007 but after following up, they made a serious action on it.right now i am enjoying their service.so far so good for me…



  34. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    @myke, your the one saying it to yuga.

    even if the profession is a lawyer tapos super tanga pala gumamit ng smartphone eh ganun parin super tanga.

    baka nagpapakitang gilas ng iPhone nya sa mga classmate nya nung elementary kaya tumaas ang bill tapos sisihin ang globe. juice ko.

    know your phone first and be smart.
    READ THE LABELS!
    (^_^)



  35. 🥉 Bronze🏆1

    And there were changes to a lot of applications after the firmware update. Mail, messengers, social-networking site and other apps may have enabled web-based notifications along the way.



  36. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    I found out about this iPhone issue after my 1st month bill. Having a Globe Post paid Plan Php 285.xx (really old SIM plan, my bill shot to Php 5,000+++

    I learned about disabling the internet access by just removing the “ph” so it does not become a hassle everytime I want to go online when outside a Wifi area.

    But since I use my iPhone in Wifi Areas most of the time, it’s been okay.



  37. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    Really can’t say whether I’m being charged for unintended use, or whether apps that I downloaded are running in background and connecting to the net, but one thing I’m sure of is that the Mail app occasionally downloads mail without my prompting, even if I’ve disabled “Fetch New Data” and set individual mail download options to “Manual.” Happened again today, but right before I updated to OS 3.1…let’s see if they’ve resolved this with the OS update.
    This notwithstanding, for now, I’m still happy with my 3GS.
    Regardless, I’d have to agree with the state of Globe’s services. From the tele-CSRs to those in the Globe service centers, they really have no idea what they’re talking about. I mean, problems like this could be a bit more tolerable if you had someone competent to whom you can complain and discuss the matter intelligently.



  38. 🥈 Silver🏆1

    daming galit sa iPhone, kung ayaw nyo sa iPhone wag kayo bumili, wag nyo gamitin. Bumili kayo ng gusto nyong cellphone at itabi nyo sa pagtulog, di yung sisiraan nyo pa. pinoy nga naman oh.



  40. 🥉 Bronze🏆1

    Ang wierd naman na P799/month internet sim pwede ikabit at may net ka na sa phone, pero grabe pag data plan ng mga telcos. And this is not just Globe it’s happening in the US too (Leo Laporte of TWiT got overcharged by AT&T).



  41. 🥇 Gold🏆1

    sell??!

    ninong, lapit na pasko! regalo mo nalang sakin yan! hehehe!

    pde din, bid namin spidey. lol!



  42. 🥉 Bronze🏆1

    I once had this problem with my Omnia. What I did was to disable to 3G and switched to GSM (edge). So everytime i want to connect to internet, i just change my connection.



  43. 🥈 Silver🏆1

    ammm…

    di ko alam kung karma yan sa mga iphone users na mayayabang… oooppss… no punt ment. mabuti pa yung much reliable 3310 :P

    sometimes simple living will not lead you to too much confusion :)



  44. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    Go for iPod Touch…I read that they have dropped the price to $199…it should be no more than 10K here.



  45. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    Customer Service from Globe called me that my bill in my iPhone Plan 3999 is 150,000++pesos. She asked me if she would disconnect my line or continue using it. I’d never paid that bill.

    I inserted my Globe iPhone Plan SIM in my Globe Tattoo and use it about 6 hours of internet. I download some stuff. I didnt know that iPhone Plan is fixed in KB charging not 10per 30mins.

    After 2 days customer service called me and inform that my bill is 150,000++.

    I dont know my credit limit but i think its around 5,000 to 10,000 because im in Plan 3999.

    Credit limit doesnt work in Globe.



  46. 🌱 Noobs🏆1

    uy suerte pa pala ako 7K pa lang ang outstanding bill ko…hehehe



  47. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    Globe browsing is free.. FBT is still working im using it on my OPENLINE Globe tatooo…. Why pay if its free.



  48. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    I was an early subscriber of Globe Visibility with the unlimited data plan. When I got my iPhone 3G, I put in my Visibility sim into it with everything turned on, push email, 3g, etc. Only problem is, the regular telephony charges are at prepaid rates. No free voice minutes or text. I’m using another Gplus account with an old, but well-loved feature phone… which is threatening to conk out anytime. I WAS planing to convert the Gplus account to an iPhone plan when it did conk out, switch the sim, then put my Visibility sim back into the dongle. Now, I’m not so sure, based on all your accounts. Having the unlimited Visibility really gives justice to the iPhone experience, so its sad to see so many people here so p1$$3d. IMHO, its Globe’s fault for not streamlining the iPhone plans to give the subscriber a more cost-effective solution, without sacrificing the experience.



  49. 🥉 Rookie🏆1

    The REST OF THE COMMENTS had become ridiculous!!!

    First of all, IGNORANCE for using your iPhone and your plan is not an excuse! If you’re really concerned about your budget and your usage, you should’ve taken necessary steps (like know what you’re getting into first and watch out for your unbilled charges) before using your phone and your plan! Know your phone and know your plan!!!

    Second, blaming others on your stupidity is absurd!!! Blame iPhone, blame Globe, blah blah… right! You have no one else to blame but yourself because of your stupidity for using your phone and your plan unwittingly like there’s no tomorrow.

    Why do you think there are still people who enjoy using their iPhone on their plan? Because they know HOW to use them and HOW it works!

    Guess some poeple here are right, iPhone is not for dumb people!!!


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