One of my team was visiting the UK. On this occasion they had their own UK Sim which had credit. All was fine until I realised some unexpected costs.
He had a WorldSim which in the UK operates on Three and was a 07452 1 xx number. His number looked like any other mobile number..
After a few days, I happened to look at my phone bill and I was slightly surprised to see I had costs in the “charges” section (I have a anytime, any network package). Every call I made was charged. In total 7 calls cost £7.74. (approx 45p per minute).
I’ve discovered that 07452 1 is a prefix used by some operators who are based in the Channel Islands, these numbers have a different delivery charge and subsequently excluded from monthly call packages as its referred to as a “special number”. WorldSim earn a proportion of this as revenue.
Although this is a UK format number, its not registered in the UK. The Isle of Man and the other channel islands are not officially part of the UK. I believe you could say that WorldSIM are mis-leading customers into thinking they have a UK Sim/Agreement when it is not.
As a user, I would have expected my phone network to advise me of the change in rate (e.g. “the number you are calling is a special number this is excluded from your plan” – O2 used to do this for calling free phone numbers, so I’m surprised that this wasn’t also announced before connecting the call, it is a number masquerading as a UK mobile and something WorldSIM know about.
Clearly WorldSim is earning revenue from both the subscriber of the WorldSim and the users calling the number, but not mentioning this on their web site. I won’t be usingWorldSim, and neither will my team in future.