Chicago Bears fan hit for thirty grand for a bit of Slingbox A hapless Slingbox user managed to run up a data bill of $28,067.31 watching a game of American football, despite being aboard a docked cruise liner and having an unlimited data tariff, thanks to a technical hitch or two. The story comes from the Chicago Sun-Times, who have managed to get AT&T to credit Wayne Burdick with most …
Should probably be why the hell he is happy paying $220 to watch a game of American football when a ticket to the ground probably costs less. Firstly, the report says he has an unlimited data tarriff, but then he says he normally pays $220 a game to do this - which is true? Secondly, if he was docked in the states surely he could have found a bar showing the game and saved $220? The really galling thing would be fast-forwarding through commercials at a cost of over $110 since at least half of an American Football game is commercials.
<quote>Roaming rates like that, without even leaving the country, make the EU look like a haven for the international traveler - perhaps once Ms Reding has battered EU operators for unreasonable behaviour, we can ship her over the pond to sort out the septics. ®</quote>
Is 'septics' a typo? I can't decide...
Paris, 'cos I can't decide about her either.
> the report says he has an unlimited data tarriff
True.
> but then he says he normally pays $220 a game to do this
WRONG. The report says he normally pays $220 a MONTH for his entire phone bill. That seems a little steep to me (it's £110 per month!) but not wildly out of line.
"once Ms Reding has battered EU operators for unreasonable behaviour, we can ship her over the pond to sort out the septics."
Being from "over the pond" I have no idea who Ms Reding is, but is "sorting out septics" the sort of job those of you in Blighty would like to see her doing? Perhaps Wacky Jacqui even more so.
The way most cruises in the US operate, the ship leaves port Sunday afternoon. Football games are also usually played on Sunday afternoon. I imagine he would not have been able to attend the game (or even watch it at home) without "missing the boat." Especially considering it probably didn't sail from Chicago in the winter. An avid fan would probably be willing to pay a $220 one-time fee to see his team while on vacation, (which was probably the wife's idea anyway).
Pirate because it looks sort of like the Oakland Raiders logo, and you don't have one for "Da Bearss."
AC, you seem to be unwilling to use your brain for higher levels of thought, such as postulation - extrapolating probable answers from the available information/, or reading the source material.
1) Mr Burdick states that his usual (one assumes monthly) phone/data bill is $220 - not (just) the cost for watching each Bears game via that connection.
2) A ticket to the ground may or may not cost less than $220 but on November 2nd (the date in question) they were playing away at the Minnesota Vikings. As Mr Burdick was on a cruise ship due to sail from Miami, Florida at 4PM EST and the game was starting at 1PM EST in Minnesota, approx. 2,000 miles away this would have made a pitch-side attendence...problomatic.
3) While a shore-side bar would have been an option this would also have risked Mr Burdick massing the departure of his ship. An on-board bar is another option but may not have been showing have games/the Bears game (hardly the atmosphear the cruise line would be trying to promote).
4) Fast-forwarding through the commercial would not have cost $110 - unless the Slingbox has been upgrade to fast-forward through liev transmissions through some bending-space-time-over-IP technology.
Not $220 a game -- that would be his total bill, unlimited data (for tethering to a computer) is typically about $60. And probably a few other phones on the line.
I agree, AT&T shouldn't have offered $6000, they should have credited it in full and said "what the hell" to the cruise ship operator -- they are not supposed to operate in-ship service in port... in international waters they can do as they wish, in port the frequencies are licensed to the local phone company and the cruise ship is not to transmit on them.
I'm pretty sure $220 represents his entirely wireless bill for the month, which would include his voice minutes, his data plan (unlimited in this case), and SMS allotments, perhaps a tethering charge (he's using a GSM modem), and all associated taxes. I admit, though. that even taking all that into consideration it seems a stretch, unless he factored in a few true international uses while on the ship which would've increased his rate.
"Less clear is why the onboard network was operational" - so as to fleece the punters; sadly this time it was noticed because some guy ran up a huge bill and queried it.
Looks like the end of a nice little earner.
BTW. could someone elucidate whether he paid $220 to watch the game, or was that per month? Looking at the comments, it could be either.
My knowledge of cruise operations is small, but I gather that cruise lines (e.g., Princess, Carnival, R Families, &c) do not own the ships but rent/ lease/ otherwise get them from someone else. If this is true, then going after Rent- a- Ship might not work (if the company is domiciled in a dubious country, enforcementwise) but going after the cruise/ event operator might if only to avoid bad publicity ("I went on a Brand X cruise and they fooked my cellphone bill through the roof!" doesn't sound like a positive endorsement, does it?). Especially if the ship didn't even move off the dock. Yaarrrr.
Yes I too racked up a bill of about £1,900 (about $3800 at the time) using my slingbox for about 45 mins roaming over in Holland via 3G.
However I argued them down based on the fact I didn't use the full 1Gb data allowance, plus the tariffs were not properly spelled out to me at any stage, including not upon arrival in Holland. Plus they tried to get out of it by saying Orange UK is NOT the same company as Orange NL and its O-NL that billed me thru O-UK and so UK couldn't do anything about it.
So in the end I wasn't required to pay one penny, in fact they didn't even charge me for my data use at home the same month cos I never went above 1GB.
Goes to show they're not making the slightest loss by relinquishing me of a bill of even that size, so this fool pays $220!! Hes getting ripped off!!
$220 for - a very rough guess based on my usage of the slingbox - about 600MB of data throughput over the course of a US footy game. Shame u cant just buy a memstick with it on for a dollar!
I thought things were cheaper in the US!?
The big phone cartel don't give a shit about customer service. We've spend three months trying to fix our FIOS cable service with absolutely no results. I don't even think they'd care if we filed a lawsuit, just as long as the Post or the Times didn't pick it up.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
