Orange Customer Services

My main phone is a T-Mobile G1. I bought this after seeing a friend demonstrate his down the pub one night and because it's not a iPhone. However as any other users know the battery life is dreadful especially if you want to use the device. Because of this I decided to get a PAYG phone for emergencies if the G1 died. I call this my "get me home phone" as it won't be used for much else.

Therefore I popped into the local branch of phones4u and puchased a Nokia 1661 on Orange PAYG. This phone seems perfect as it is light (2 grams), small and has a standby battery life measured in weeks. Bargain too, £14.95 for the phone plus a £10 toupup. I decided to link my debit card to the account to allow easy online or phone call topups. However I wanted to setup a auto topup so when my balance falls to say £5 it would automatically topup by £10. I called Orange Customer Services to request this. The guy on the phone took my card details and I explained £10 everytime balance falls below £5. "No problem sir" was the reply. 5 minutes later a text arrives saying my £10 topup was succesful and my balance is now £18.91. Wonderful the droid had basically performed a one off topup and completely ignored/misunderstood my perfectly clear and reasonable request. Where do they get these people?

I have since learnt that you can't get completely automated topup but there is a SMS service that alerts you when credit is low and allows you to reply to topup.

Anyway thanks Orange Customer Services, my first time contacting you resulted in a incorrectly actioned request, how you inspire confidence.

Sony Ericsson W880i

Earlier this year I decided to no longer have a contract mobile phone for personal use. The main reason for this is that although I work in telecoms I don't actually make that many personal calls. I liked the look of the Tesco Mobile offering and bought a LG KC550 phone from one of their stores. Pretty quickly I became a bit disillunsioned with this phone mainly due to its poor battery life.

So last week I went back to the store and purchased a Sony Ericsson W880i. I love this phone. Although it is not the most fully featured of available phones the size of it is amazing and fits into pockets easily and discreetly. Best of all the phone has 3G and a app that allows me to blog here right from the phone.