A Canadian man has been charged $1,171 for using in-flight Wi-Fi on his Singapore Airlines flight.
Jeremy Gutsche, an executive at Toronto-based consultancy company Trend Hunter, said he incurred the charges last week on a flight from London to Singapore. Gutsche said that he purchased 30MB of in-flight data for $28.99 and he was well aware of the overage fees.
In order to rack up $1,171 worth of Wi-Fi fees all he did was visit 155 webpages, view a few emails, and spent one hour uploading a single PowerPoint document. Even though Gutsche attempted to get Singapore Airlines to reduce the bill, the company said he must pay the full amount.
“But the airline ultimately told him that he must pay the full amount, according to Gutsche. Asked about the apparent resolution to the charges, the Singapore Airlines spokesman said he could not provide any details about the carriers’ discussions with Gutsche.”
In a statement to The Wall Street Journal, in-flight Internet service provider OnAir said:
“To consume several hundred megabytes during one flight takes much more than basic email viewing, for example downloading heavy attachments, cloud access and using Skype.”
If you are going on a flight and you purchase Wi-Fi data from the airline, be sure to read the terms of service and monitor your own data usage. Over the past year we have seen more North American airlines include an in-flight Wi-Fi option for all their passengers.
[via The Wall Street Journal]
Want to see more of our stories on Google?
P.S. Want to keep this site truly independent? Support us by buying us a beer, treating us to a coffee, or shopping through Amazon here. Links in this post are affiliate links, so we earn a tiny commission at no charge to you. Thanks for supporting independent Canadian media!
How difficult is it to just leave the device off.
From what I’ve seen and experienced – very difficult. They don’t call it addiction for nothing.
Its a long flight, and that was one huge power point file.
Stupid question but why didn’t it just cut him off after 30MB of usage?
I read this in another article but apparently, its possible to do this but he opted for the other option, which is to let the data continue running so critics are calling the CEO out for actually KNOWING that he would cross the data barrier
Overages are a moneymaker?
Duh.
“Passengers can choose to end their sessions when they reach a certain price limit, a graphic shows data consumption at all times and users can disconnect whenever they want.”
Didn’t read the original article til now. I feel no sympathy for the schmuck now.
… he did purchase 30mb of data, not a baby sitter or a secretary 🙂
Seems to me that this is exactly what these types of pricing structures are designed to do. Do you really think its cost them twice as much to provide you with 60MB as 30MB?
The right thing the airline should do is give the customer a warning on his screen once he has reached his limit. Then give the client the option to resume or shut off the phone.
Very simple. That’s customer service.
how big was the PPT document.. and why did he need to upload it from the plane? what a dunce
$1,171 to have every national newspaper mentioning his consultancy firm’s name (Trend Hunter), pretty cheap advertising.
Oh never mind, the Wallstreet Journal as well. $1,171 very well spent.
Thats what happens when you stream porn lol.