Got a message on my mobile saying I'd received a "Premium Rate Text" but didn't have enough credit to open it. Topped up, read the "for a free holiday, text your name, etc." rubbish and deleted it...........and £1.25 disappeared from my balance!!

What can I do to stop that kind of thing? What a waste of money!

I used to work in the mobile phone industry and have been complaining to Ofcom for a long time that these charges shouldn't be legal, but they never listen.

OFCOM dont regulate premium rate services, the government agency PhonePayPlus does (Sounds like a dodgy company but it is indeed the correct angecy) - their website can be found here:- Welcome to PhonepayPlus the regulator of phonepaid services (http://www.phonepayplus.org.uk/output/default.aspx)

You should raise the illicit text with your service provider first as with all premium rate services in the UK the actual majority of funds paid to the vendor (the one sending the messages) is witheld in full for 30 days and realeased in portions of 90 days.

SPAM messages like this are illegal unless you have somehow requested this service, there are tight regulations about hiding opt in and costs for these services in small print etc so you must explicitly have been made aware of what you are going to be charged for beforehand - otherwise it is illegal and should be refunded - chances are your not the first person and your service provider already has established a protocol for dealing with complaints from this source.

Good luck and let me know if you need to know more detail (the company I am consulting with operates is one of the major premium rate service providers).

Many thanks A and J. Will contact my service provider and let you know the outcome.

The telco's first response will be to wash their hands of it and tell you to contact the third party company concerned.

Utter crap, of course, but these scams are a nice revenue earner and they don't want to rock the boat. Orange, particularly, are notorious for allowing their network to be used by all sorts of undesirables perpetrating these scams.

I actually have a letter from their Executive Head Office admitting that Orange have "no control" over third party operators.......I'm not sure it's what they meant to say but it's very true nonetheless.

You have more clout if you have a contract mobile because you simply request an audit trail proving that you subscribed or opted in to the said service (these messages usually start arriving regulalrly once the scammer knows they've hit a live number). You inform the telco that unless they provide said audit trail, you'll contact Plod and report the matter as fraud.

They refund every time.....but PAYG mobiles may be very different.

I would follow StaceyF's route even if it is a PAYG. Fraud is fraud.

To you, it's just £1.50. To some scallywag somewhere, it's many times £1.50.

To some scallywag somewhere, it's many times £1.50.

Have a look HERE (http://www.phonepayplus.org.uk/output/Recent-adjudications.aspx) at the level of fines meted out to see the sort of money we're talking about.

A lot of these artists will cheerfully cough up fines of £40,000 and they're still quids-in :ugh::ugh::ugh::ugh: