Does anybody else have Viber or Whatsapp charges on their AT&T phone bill?

@bngui -

Since evidently it's still not clear, I'd like to emphasize again - Viber does not automatically switch to GSM mid-call. This option does not exist and cannot occur (there's a technical reason for that, not just "wishful thinking" from our part).

The only way of switching to GSM is by pressing a button, which either opens up a pop-up, or not. In both cases, this causes the Viber call to disconnet (and that, obviously, can be noticed by both sides!), and only then the ringing sound of the GSM call is heard (which sounds different than Viber's), etc. etc.

Having said that, as I mentioned in my reply above, I will pass on this request and we will see what we can do to better prevent such cases in the future.

@ suman.ganta-

We're quite surprised and sad to see such hostility in your post above towards us. We are one of the only app developing companies (if not the only one) who actively reaches out to forums and blogs, and care enough to personally reply to each and every comment made by our users - even if these are bad comments and criticism.

Anyway, as an answer to your question - the reason why many (many) users use Viber's dialer as their default one is actually the opposite of what you describe - they take into account that Viber's dialer can either simply direct them to the person they want to call anyway (so - the call will be made through the cellular provider, and the charges will be what they would have paid anyway), OR they can call them through Viber, at which case it will be free.

And yes, we acknolwedge there is the rare possibility described by @bngui . Our response to that case is explained above, please thoroughly read it.

Well, I'm not paid by anyone to provide my feedback. But I wouldn't call myself as a personal care giver to Viber. Anyway, the reason for my anguish is something I've already stated. And the reason why I'm saying you guys don't take any feedback is this - You are describing re-installing your app is the only way to re-enable the warning message that warns which way the call is being connected. How can you justify that as a user friendly configurable option? You are describing a workaround as a feature. That evidently shows that you are not interested in taking feedback.

Although I fully (i mean fully) understood what is happening when a call is made from viber dialer, I've never seen you acknowleging anything to my posts. And you are also saying that it is rare when so many people are complaining about how much money they've lost with your false advertising and lack of documentation (for this specific issue).

Your website's first highlight about your product is this -

Free international calls and text messages to other Viber users using 3G or Wi-Fi.

Now, you say that a warning (when you cannot make a free call) that says call is made by GSM is ignorable. If every user who make international calls via viber ignores such a warning message (provided it is not turned off), doesn't it completely contradict the first highlight of your product as mentioned in your website?

Thank you for your response.

First, what you are saying is not accurate. Naturally, a developer cannot change the app on an hourly basis based on specific users' complaints (yes - this case, as much as we acknowledge its severity - and we do! - is indeed relatively rare). However, once an issue becomes bigger and more popular among users, we do care to consider changing the app accordingly and in fact we have done so several times already, i.e making changes in Viber SOLELY due to popular user demand. Here is just one of many examples, in this case on Viber on Android: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=23290460#post23290460

Secondly, you have not addressed my very elaborate answer to your claims in previous posts - Viber does not (and simply technically cannot) automatically switch the call to a GSM call in the middle of the Viber call, as you claimed earlier in this thread. Thus - saying that a switch to a GSM call is "ignored" is simply incorrect. Yes, we give the user the option to choose "not show that message again in the future". Once chosen personally by the user, this can be reverted only after reinstall. This isn't that far-fetched - a user chose to ignore that messgae, and if they choose to revert that personal decision, they need to reinstall - a process that lasts about 2 minutes.

HOWEVER - as I have mentioned at least 2 times above, I will pass on your request to add an option that brings this pop-up message back. You'll need to understand that as a company with limited resources, we are obligated to attend faster to very popular user demands, so bear in mind that the addition of such option may take a while, as long as the complaint about it is rare.

Hi,

All the calls I made with Viber appear on my AT&T bill.

I feel cheated by a company that promise free calls and fails to its engagement. I believe they are responsible for the lack of info they provide to their customers. I had to read this forum to understand how it really works. If viber really wants to give the people's more freedom by placing free calls so they should be transparent and warn them about those dysfunctions and not let them discover the truth through unaffordable bills from At&t. They are not pro with their communication which seems weird for a company based on communication services. I am going to stick with Skype from now on. Christmas is approaching and I am sad that the $400 telephone bill I have to pay today, will harm my children and family. (Sorry if my English is not perfect. ) I feel disgusted by the lies of the promise of a better lifestyle when the result is just worst and give me the feeling that I have even less control of my actions. The one who wins here is AT&T. This is really a big failure.

Hi @Tatopani -

Viber itself is totally free, meaning we (Viber) don't charge anything from you.

Since Viber uses the internet, both sides of the conversation must be connected to either WiFi or 3G. If a user is connected to WiFi - that user is not paying anything for sure. If the user is connected to 3G, the user *may* be paying his cell company for the data (about 0.3MB per minute of call), but that depends on the specific data plan that he has with his cellular company, and needs to be verified with them.

* Note that when a user is abroad using the cellular network (and not WiFi), there may be high Roaming charges by your cellular company for the data used.

When you make a Viber call, make sure your screen stays purple (Viber) and does not switch to the regular calling screen of your phone (meaning - a cellular call). Sometimes the call is switched to a normal cellular call because your internet connection is disrupted or the destination contact is temporarily not recognized as a Viber user.

When this happens, a message pops up alerting the user that the call is switching to a regular, cellular call (thus costing money). The user has to accept it to continue the call.

My mom recently fell victim to viber. She was charged $287.00. Why is it that almost everyone who fell victim to this is an AT&t user. My mom has AT&T as well. Also I agree that if viber was really concerned, they would have taken action already. I will research more of what can be done about this issue because it really isn't right. Something is definitely wrong and it shouldn't be ignored. I definitely will not be using viber anymore but I guess that doesn't really matter when there are billions of other people who will fall victim. I can only imagine how much money that's worth. The money is going somewhere.

@Marie232 -

Hi,

As we've already explained here on this thread, it is not us (Viber) who charge you at all.

Please see our very detailed reaponse above, explaining what could have caused those charges.

is there a way to block (like a check box in setting) viber from switching to regular call? My wife was charged $150 for making international call to viber member without her awareness (only for 45 minute, for which we normally paid 3-5 cents/minute using different service like V247). I look in the setting and no option there. Could Viber team look into this? We really want Viber is only for viber call at all time. Thanks.

@kcjbd -

Viber pops up a warning message that lets the user know that it is switching to a regular (cellular) call. This message always shows up, unless the user manually checks a box (in that warning message), choosing to "not show the warning again".

I am so frustrated with Viber AND, to a lessor extent AT&T. I downloaded Viber so I could message and speak with my friend in Canada. Just 8 days into my billing cycle I noticed I had racked up $270.00 in charges from AT&T. So I called AT&T to see what was going on. They told me that the reason for this high amount is that AT&T is charging me for my international messages. Now the only international messages I sent were to my friend in Canada and only through Viber. I told AT&T this and they said that made no difference and that iPhones catch these messages and they are billed like any others. They went on to say they did not recommend 3rd party messaging services. So the exact thing that Viber says is not supposed to happen with their product actually happens. And of course AT&T would reccomend not using 3rd party services like Viber becasue it means more $ for them, but for international messages, it is just too cost prohibitive for me to use anything other than a 3rd party.

So, I only message my friend from Viber and only when I have a Wifii connection. There is no, and has never been, any type of warning from Viber that the message I was sending through Viber was being sent non-wifi. This defeats the whole purpose of having Viber or any other 3rd party messaging/calling service. If you suggest I turn off all non-wifi functions on my phone in order to use Viber, I will just erase the worthless app and use facebook instead.

In AT&T's defense, they credited me for all my Canada messages up to this point, but I can't very well go back to using Viber and expect that AT&T will be so gracious in the future. I learned my lesson with Viber.

Here is some advice for the designers at Viber. The whole reason anyone uses this app is so they don't have to pay the ridiculas international messaging rates. So why not make the app impossible to work unless it is working only through Wifi? It shouldn't be able to even switch back to cell service in the middle of a call. Who the heck looks at their phone while they are talking? Even if this mysterous warning message were to appear, you would never see it. And with messaging? Well, there is no excuse. If I am hooked up to Wifi, Viber is not apparently able to keep AT&T from charging me for messages sent through Viber on my iPhone. And viber should be designed so it can't send a message except through wifi. Anyway, Viber is very dissapointing but you get what you pay for. Maybe I am just too frustrated.

Okay, so I get it that many people use Viber for many different reasons so maybe I am not seeing the bigger picture here. I would like to ad that I live in a remote fishing village in Alaska and, as such, have no 3G and only cell service and internet via the satelite. How is is possible that AT&T had every message I sent using Viber? Is there a function that I can use that would restrict my Viber messages to only internet? What if I send a message to a viber user and she is on 3G? Argh.

Hi @etalik1467 -

Thank you for sharing the details of this issue.

Look, as we explained earlier in this thread, Viber itself is totally free, meaning we (Viber) don't charge anything from you.

Since Viber uses the internet, both sides of the conversation must be connected to either WiFi or 3G. If a user is connected to WiFi - that user is not paying anything for sure. If the user is connected to 3G, the user *may* be paying his cell company for the data (about 0.3MB per minute of call), but that depends on the specific data plan that he has with his cellular company, and needs to be verified with them.

The purpose of this option, that you deem useless, is for people to easily and quickly switch to a GSM call, in case their internet connection (3G, usually) is disrupted, and cannot allow a Viber conversation to be held. This feature is actually very popular, and is very convenient to most of our users.

The warning messages that pops up when trying to call a user THROUGH the application is not a small, negligble one. You can find more specific details in this page, in our official HelpDesk: http://helpme.viber.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/18/6/iphone-what-i s-viber-and-is-viber-really-free

Me myself was the latest victim of this.

ATT charged me $65 for international calls. The calls were made through VIBER.

I know clearly when you have ATT mobile, you cannot just connect or make an international call, there's gonna be an warning Voice message saying you're not allowed to make international phone calls.

So how can ATT know about it and charge me? Sorry for for a dumb question, but Data vs. Cellular network are different or not? How can they switch from Data to regular GSM and get charged?

@hoangtoon -

Viber doesn't 'care' if you use your data in order to call abroad, or call domestically. Same goes for AT&T - data is data, and they should not be able to 'monitor' those calls and differentiate between the data you use.

Please see our very elaborate explanation above your comment, that should make all of this issue clearer. If you still have questions about thoroughly reading it, please let us know.

Why and when does a call switch to regular GSM? People use Viber becaus of its ability to use VoIP to place the call. So, basically its a FREE call. If and when a user wants to call regular they will use the standard carrier's calling app.

Can't Viber automatically see that both parties are using Viber and therefore NEVER allow accidentally using regular GSM call for such (when in the Viber app)? Why would any sane person want to call otherwise? I have been charged over $300 for an hour call which all that time I thought was VoIP FREE call since we both use Viber.

So, instead of a pop-up warning, just DONT allow it because 101% of the time the user doesnt want paid call while using Viber.