SingTel customers complain of wrong additional charges in telephone bills

SINGAPORE: Some customers of telco SingTel have complained of wrong additional charges in their telephone bills.

One SingTel customer said her husband received more than 10 charges for a premium rate service she did not subscribe to.

Premium rate services are available to all mobile users, and include services like games and quizzes.

Each charge was S$4 to S$8. The total charges came up to S$64.

The charges are from a third—party company TMG Asia Pte Ltd.

A police report has also been filed and the third party company is uncontactable.

"We just told SingTel that we received these web messages from a company. And they immediately told us they would give us a 50 per cent discount. How can there be an additional service that we do not know of? If we don’t opt out of it, will such things happen again?" the customer said.

In response to a query from Channel NewsAsia, SingTel said it received feedback from some customers about such charges.

It said it bills on behalf of the content provider, and assists customers if there are disputes over charges by highlighting their case with the respective content provider and tracking the progress on their behalf.

A SingTel spokesperson also said under the IDA’s guidelines, content providers like TMG Asia Pte Ltd are required to state clearly upfront the charges for each and every transaction.

Customers have the option of opting—in or opting—out of the charges.

SingTel has advised its customers to ignore and delete SMS text messages from unfamiliar numbers, if in doubt.

It added it has provided customers with the option of blocking such premium rate services from their phones since February last year.

Consumer watchdog CASE said it has seen 98 of such cases involving third—party charges in 2012.

— CNA/de