Huge bill for mobile broadband consumer

A British consumer has revealed how he was charged with bill close to £22,000 for using his mobilebroadband package while overseas.

During a skiing trip at Meribel in France, Will Pierce used his £25 data card from Vodafone to download and watch television programmes.

According to the Daily Mail, Mr Pierce was issued with a bill for £21,716 after his usage was charged for each megabyte used, including an estimated £5,000 for just one programme.

Mr Pierce told the newspaper that it is "utterly staggering" that Vodafone could allow users to rack up such a "huge bill" without appropriate caution or an agreed credit limit.

"There's no warning when you log on how much it will cost a minute or a counter on the screen telling you what it is costing," he explained.

"If you ran up such a bill on your credit card while overseas you'd get a call checking that it is you who is spending so much."

Last year, Vodafone charged one customer a £11,000 bill for downloading four episodes of Friends via mobilebroadband during a holiday, the Telegraph has reported.

The European Parliament is currently considering proposals to stipulate that users should not pay anything over 46p per megabyte when accessing a data roaming service while abroad.