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meals

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#127392 8-Aug-2013 17:39
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Hi there,

I'm posting here because we are a customer of  Orcon and have recieved two invoices with excess data usage.

The first invoice was in June and was 47GB over our 30GB usage, I contacted them about this as we have previously never gone over our limit of  30GB, their technical team told me that it was over 2  days that the excess data was used I was not happy  with this so left it outstanding.

Then I recieved a second invoice from Orcon charging us for 350GB over our 30GB usage, I promptly called them, after numerous conversations and phone calls to their call centre and terrible service, they told me that after their investigation they tell me that 350GB was used over 4 days in July and it ws from streaming iTunes.

We now have a bill for $801.

I was not happy with this, we usually use around 17GB per month have not changed the way we use the internet in any way at all.  We mainly use it for browsing facebook, checking emails, bank account website, We don't stream music, watch tv on demand, download movies.  We have, since March rented 9 movies from the iTunes store and watched them but never on any of the dates Orcon specify.

We actually usually rent movies from the DVD store and are too busy with having just had a baby and juggling a new busy family life to do much more else on the internet.

Orcon offered to pay 50% of the bill, of which I declined because I'm still not willing to pay for something I 100% believe we have not used. The situation is now deadlock and we have been told to go to TDR.

Can I please ask your opinion on the following:
1. Is it possible to use 350GB  via streaming iTunes over 4 days (bearing in mind we just own a basic store Mac and 2 iphones).
2. If it is possible, what sort of thing would we have needed to be doing on the internet - e.g. downloading 30 films?
3. I don't want to be a customer with Orcon any more - how would it look if we now changed service providers during the TDR process?

Thanks for your time, apologies that this is a long post just wanted to try and put as much information  down as possible.  Any advice would be appreciated.  As you can probably tell we aren't high internet usages, so cannot understand why Orcon believe that we have used this much data.

Thanks!
Meals

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BinaryLimited
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  #874034 8-Aug-2013 17:45
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ooo this is abit of a tough one......."he said she said" convo, no way of proving anything from your end.
Feel your pain as iv also had my Orcon nightmares while being routed around the world to many call centers .
Have you tried emailing the CEO? Worked for us...

Prob would of been cheaper to go on their "unlimited" package.

Hope you get this sorted coz that is just a crazy internet bill!




 
 
 

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FireEngine
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  #874036 8-Aug-2013 17:55
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PM me your account details please Amelia, this isnt what we want to happen at all.




Regards FireEngine


meals

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  #874041 8-Aug-2013 18:05
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Thanks BinaryLimited, yes, the unlimited package would have been better and saved us this bother however have been a customer with Orcon for 2 years and 30GB of data was originally a lot to me especially since we are people that usually use on average of 17gb I thought we would be well clear to only have up to 30GB limit.

other people we have spoken to who are more technical than us say that it would be like downloading and watchinng 2 movies every day for a month! Which we certainly don't do anything like that.




RunningMan
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  #874057 8-Aug-2013 18:20
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meals:
1. Is it possible to use 350GB  via streaming iTunes over 4 days (bearing in mind we just own a basic store Mac and 2 iphones).
2. If it is possible, what sort of thing would we have needed to be doing on the internet - e.g. downloading 30 films?


350GB is a high amount to go through in a few days, but it would be possible. If you had a download that was getting stuck, and continually trying to download again, that would use a lot of data in a short time - this could be anything from a movie to an app or iOS update. Check that photostream on an IOS device isn't trying to sync with iCloud and got stuck. A torrent or malware running without your knowledge could also be using data without you realising it.

Despite this being over and above your normal usage, it doesn't necessarily mean this is a problem with Orcon or their traffic accounting. There are many previous threads on these forums where people have had similar problem, and tracked it back to something on one of their devices that they hadn't thought of.

Having said that, flick a PM to one of the Orcon staff that have popped up here, and see if they can help you with tracking down the problem.

BinaryLimited
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michaelmurfy
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  #874065 8-Aug-2013 18:25
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Checked for anything that you don't own using WiFi?




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Spike14
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  #874069 8-Aug-2013 18:28
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I had an issue with Orcon with overusage once when I rebooted my Genius for the first time in 59 days.  For some strange reason Orcon generated a data record for the usage for the entire previous 59 days - over 350GB.  Like you I had a $700+ bill until I showed then the evidence - the sum of my usage for the previous 59 days equaled the usage they were recording for that day. 

The Orcon portal has all your previous usage available on a daily basis and it's easy to put into a spreadsheet




Lias
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  #874096 8-Aug-2013 18:52
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Is your WiFi secured (WPA2)?




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Inphinity
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  #874101 8-Aug-2013 18:59
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As others have said, unexpected wifi clients? 350GB in 4 days is totally doable, unless you have a particularly slow connection. Is it primarily download or upload usage, or roughly even? No torrent programs running on any devices? No visitors who may have been using anything?

FireEngine
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  #874111 8-Aug-2013 19:10
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Thanks for the details Amelia, I'll look into it.

In the meantime look into the areas Running man mentions, if there is a download getting stuck then changing ISP won't fix that.

App updates, IOS updates, Photostream all chew data on occasion, highly likely to be the cause.

Edit to add: Your upload is high on the same days that your download goes high but it isn't symetrical usage - I'd suspect 1 of your Apple devices may have been syncing UP, the other devices trying to sync DOWN and something(s) getting stuck and causing the download to keep restarting...eventually it completes so the high usage stops.




Regards FireEngine


BinaryLimited
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  #874125 8-Aug-2013 19:29
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@fireengine

seeing as you are from Orcon, iv always been interested in the following "unlimited" plans but is always restricted to "fair usage" in the terms and conditions...

what would you / orcon classify as "fair usage" considering its an unlimited plan.No one can seem to give me an answer for that.
being said, everyones usage is different .

example : my fair usage is about 500gb-1000gb a month...but for other users ( as in Amelia's case ) 30gb is reasonable.




freitasm
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  #874133 8-Aug-2013 19:37
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To the OP (meals), what router brand and model are you using on this line?





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Batman
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  #874174 8-Aug-2013 20:12
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Someone is using your wifi

freitasm
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  #874175 8-Aug-2013 20:16
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either that or the router has an open DNS resolver and is being used in a DDoS Smurf attack. We can only know when the OP replies with router brand and model.




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meals

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  #874178 8-Aug-2013 20:20
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Thanks for your help.

I understand the points you have all made so can see how it might be possible. However, just a few extra points to note. After the first issue with going over 47gb in June, the orcon call centre told me that there were 6 devices connected to our wifi. We only had 3. They suggested I change my password and I did.

You would think after this that orcon would keep a look at our account after suggesting someone else was using our data. And be triggered by the fact that our usage peaked even higher in july to 350gb so that they could notify us or stop our Internet temporarily so that it could be figured out what was wrong.

If we had knowingly been downloading etc it would have been smarter to switch to the unlimited plan before we did that.

The problem is you say it could be something we are doing on one of our devices yet no one can tell us what not even orcon and the thing is we have not changed the way we use the Internet at all. We don't use the icloud and even though I have an iPhone it doesn't even play sound or movies.

I'd like to be able to go through and check all the things you mention but I'm not sure how, as we are not technically savvy. so in terms of putting a case forward to TDR we can only provide what we can orcon certianly has the upper hand in that respect.


Thanks for your help everyone.


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