Man receives £42,000 bill for data roaming charges after Morocco holiday

The Guardian - World NewsEN 2 min read 100% complete by Hayden VernonFebruary 20, 2026 at 04:39 PM

AI Summary

medium article 2 min

A small business owner, Andrew Alty, received a £42,000 bill from O2 after his daughter incurred significant data roaming charges while on a family holiday in Marrakech, Morocco. The charges stemmed from her TikTok usage, which amounted to over £5,000 per hour. Alty's contract, purchased through Currys, lacked a data cap for roaming outside of Europe, leading to the exorbitant bill. He contacted the Financial Ombudsman Service, but they ruled Currys responsible for explaining the contract terms. After the Telegraph intervened, both Currys and O2 agreed to waive the charges, resolving the issue. The case highlights the potential for unexpectedly high roaming charges and the importance of understanding contract details.

Key Entities & Roles

Key Player Opposition Context

Manchester 30% United Kingdom 40% Marrakech 40% Europe 40% TikTok 50% Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) ×260% Morocco 70% Currys ×570% O2 ×880% Andrew Alty ×690%

Keywords

data roaming charges 100% mobile phone bill 80% uncapped data 70% financial ombudsman service 60% currys 50% o2 50% contract dispute 50% customer service 50% morocco 40%

Sentiment Analysis

Very Negative

Score: -0.70

Source Transparency

Source

The Guardian - World News

Classification Confidence

90%

This article was automatically classified using rule-based analysis.

Topic Connections

Explore how the topics in this article connect to other news stories

Network visualization showing 42 related topics

View Full Graph

data roaming charges mobile phone bill uncapped data financial ombudsman service currys o2 contract dispute customer service morocco

Explore Full Topic Graph

Find Similar Articles

AI-Powered

Discover articles with similar content using semantic similarity analysis.