HTC Smart On 02 Pt 3

Within a week of using my HTC Smart phone, I was gradually feeling more and more underwhelmed with it. Given how limited it is by design, multiplied by the limited functionality O2 put on it with a Pay&Go deal it turns into a very basic but flashy touchphone. I decided to return it for a lower end touchphone, the Samsung Tocco Lite. Turns out O2 (and the other networks) may be onto a nice little illegal earner.

When you buy a Pay&Go phone you're forced to top up £10 at the time of purchase, or £20 if you're paying by cash. They say the networks impose these conditions because people are buying the subsided phones to unlock and sell on abroad. These fees are mandatory, and non-refundable. As it is, this is calling credit, so you'd assume that returning one phone on O2 to replace it with another on O2 would be simple right? Just take the partially used SIM card and put it in the new phone and avoid the new mandatory topup fees. Turns out that the SIM cards are apparently locked to that phone, so you either use the credit up before refunding the phone, or lose that credit. Either way you have to buy ANOTHER mandatory top up with the new phone.

Just how much money are the networks scamming out of people in unused credit like this? Is there a class action lawsuit in this? I'm going to speak to Trading Standards in the UK to see their position on this practice.

Imagine this scenario:

ALL phones are free, regardless of network or handset. You pay with either the cost of the handset in non-refundable call credit, or a long contract. That way if a customer decides they don't like the phone or deal they can bring it back for a refund of £0 since the phone was free. The money they paid is pure profit for the network. Would Trading Standards hammer them for that? I suspect if the networks thought they'd get away with it, they'd do it in a heartbeat. A way to legally honour a full refund without paying back a penny.

To further complicate things for me, the Tocco Lite was much more expensive in the O2 store than everywhere else, and they are one of the few stores in the modern world who don't price match with cheaper competitors. This meant either paying 25% more, or getting a refund and buying the phone elsewhere.

A few memorable quotes during these exchanges come to mind:

• "We're a more expensive network but you get what you pay for" - Yes, 3 minutes to get to the mobile version of Google.com is a quality service you just can't put a price on.
• "Email should work on all smartphones, either Pay&Go or contract" - Not according to the O2 support line, or the port blocking on the phone itself, but they're still happy to sell new ones on a false premise.

Unfortunately I have no choice but to use O2 to get a decent signal. If you have a choice, avoid O2 like the plague. They have so many hidden clauses and gotchas built into the way they work it's unbelievable. You almost get the feeling that as you stumble on one, there's another 3 or 4 that you don't know about

There's no consistency either between staff and stores. Out of curiosity I asked in the Falkirk store "if I was to buy an HTC Smart on a Pay&Go deal and wanted to use email, would that be fine?" and the dude told me what I found out from the support line, "email doesn't work on Pay&Go, you'd need a contract for that". The Stirling staff are clueless.

Staff not mentioning one of the few basic functions of the phone being limited BEFORE purchase, staff not knowing it IS crippled after it's queried, staff still assuming it's not crippled even after being told it is, staff forgetting to mention the mandatory credit is locked to the phone and non-refundable when the return is being discussed and what the options are......and subsequently only finding out when I returned with the box, manuals etc It felt like every subsequent visit to the O2 store in Stirling I found out something new that I should have been told beforehand. This is the underlying logic of the "there's lot's of gotchas with O2" sentiments.

I paid in cash, but they wanted the full name, postal address, home number etc for the refund. No doubt that information would be used to spam me with O2 marketing stuff, and sold onto to anyone and everyone to get me even more junk mail or sales calls. I told him to invent details, as I was not giving O2 any of mine. The number I told him to put down was the SIM with £9.80 (ish) unused credit.

The Tocco Lite isn't too bad, the browser is much faster despite being a lower spec. The touch screen is less responsive however and the keyboard is a bit awkward in that even if you use a slim point, it's impossible for the display to show you hitting just one key at once, so it's incredibly easy to enter the letter next to the one you thought you'd hit. It'll take a bit of getting used to and with a bit of luck there's a firmware upgrade to fix that lil issue. There's features I like from both phones, and some I like from higher end phones but for now I'm happy.

To sum things up, I like the HTC Smart, as basic as it was, but O2 behave like cowboys.How many others have thrown away money with this mandatory top up which then had to be returned? Not just with O2, I believe this is one of the few industry standard practices carried out by all the networks. How much free money have the networks gotten from us with this? Is there a class action lawsuit for this? If not, perhaps there should be. I get the fact that the phones are subsidised and they need to protect themselves to some degree, but why not add that cost to the phone itself, and not insist on any credit top up? Oh, the current deal is a licence to print money......that's why.