My October phone bill showed that I had been charged for sending global text messages as well as for exceeding my data limit.

As I hardly send text messages to anyone, let alone global text messages, I called M1's customer service to ask which country or number the text messages had been sent to. There was no record of any overseas text message on my end.

The customer service officer told me that he could not tell which country, but said the charge was valid. If I wanted to find out, I would have to pay for a report that would cost $5 per page.

As for the data limit, I have 16GB of data every month, which I find hard to fully use as I neither play games nor watch videos, and use a Wi-Fi connection at home and at the office.

But according to my October bill, I used about 19.7GB. I had not received any text notifications about using 90 per cent of my data or hitting the data limit.

When I asked the customer service officer when my data had been used, he again said he could not tell but that the charge was valid.

How can a telco charge its customers without having to account for how they are being charged?

To ensure transparency and fairness, telcos should give customers detailed billing information, and the Consumers Association of Singapore should look into such billing practices.

Sissi Goh