Back in July I ran up a heavy bill whilst I was in India.

Yesterday I got a computer generated SMS saying that I still owed 7000 baht odd on my bill.

Now I know that is not true as I have the receipts to show that I paid the bill for July. Normal bills are around 1000 baht per month.

So I went in to the local DTAC office and asked why they had sent the message.

I got a real load of bullshit, about cancelled payments, and the computer not being in sync, until I showed them the DTAC receipts, then it went very quiet.

They called Bangkok, but could not get an answer there either.

I am pretty sure my wife's bill is screwed up as well, but I have to wait until the credit card bill comes to double check.

Have you checked you bill??

Hi Astral,

I deal with satellite airtime providers. Now this might not be the same situation with GSM providers, but it is very likely.

Some telco's are really late getting their CDR's (call data records) out the door, depending on the quality of the provider. It wouldn't provide me in the slightest if the GSM provider in India only recently sent the CDR's for your calls to DTAC, which then have to be backdated to the previous month.

The fact that it didn't turn up on your July bill might simply mean that the Indian GSM provider you had hooked into when roaming hadn't sent DTAC the CDR's before DTAC issues the invoices for their customers for that month.

Does this sound clear? It may explain the situation.

Happens all the time with satellite providers (such as Glocall, France Telecom, Xantic etc etc).

Cheers,

Insight

No, that wasn't the case.

My bill for July had come through, it was about 9000 baht and I had cleared it

I have the receipts to prove that. They had even rebated a few calls that did not connect, so their computer shows I have a credit balance.

That is why I was very upset to be told that I owed 7000 baht...

Defamation of character??