Wind Italy - Confused!

[ca-uk]

I bought a Wind sim card (as per other thread) and asked for Mega Internet to be enabled. This cost me 30euro in total.

When the sim was activated, it said i had 5euro credit.

I was briefly able to connect to the internet in both my phone and my dongle.

My client area looks like the attached.

Later in the day (yesterday), when i checked my credit it was 0euro - i thought maybe it was because i had used data before mega unlimited was active - i used the internet at 10am, but my text to say mega unlimited was active didn't arrive until 2pm.

Yesterday evening, i topped up by 15euro - i received a text to confirm, and on checking my balance it was 15euro.

However, this morning, without using the phone and still unable to connect to data, then my balance is 0euro again. Can anyone help me understand what is going on? So far i'm 45euro down with nothing to show for it

[ca-uk]

i've just topped up by another 15 euro, and now been sent this:

le abbiamo addebitato -15 euro a fronte dei 20 euro previsiti dal costo mensile di mega unlimited. per utilizzare l'offerta deve effettuare una ricarica

my balance is now 10euro - does it mean i have to top up more, or does it mean it is now all good and i have mega unlimited?

[cregaune]

I had a similar problem. I'm in the UK too. As a result of another problem that I asked about further down this forum, two days ago I topped up with 15 Euro in order to send a text message to stop my Mega Unlimited package. It appeared for a few minutes on my balance on the Wind web site, but an hour later it was gone and the balance is back down to zero euros.

I think there are major problems with Wind top-up at the moment and the annoying thing is that there seems to be no way to contact them. Typical Italian!

[ca-uk]

i think i've figured it out - in the minute and a bit that i had a connection, it managed to suck down 25 euros worth of data - using up my credit and preventing the mega unlimited from activating - even though it said it was active. the 15 euro top up today removed the 'debt' from my account, leaving me with 10 euro credit, and mega unlimited is now active and finally working. so, it means i blew 25 euro credit on data, but should be able to surf the rest of the week that i'm here, so all in an expensive data trip (i put 30euro on my 3.ie sim, which is not getting 3g, plus the total 60euro spent on wind sim and credit) - so 90 euro on data, but still cheaper than paying per mb. at least i know for next time..

do you have access to your wind.it online account? i think that when you credit, it appears to go on your account for some time, but then gets swallowed up to cancel any 'debt'

if you go to 'il tuo traffico' - does it show any 'debito residuale' in the 'addebiti e accrediti' section? after my 15 euro topup yesterday, this shows 5euro debiti, which explains where 5 euro of today's 15 euro topup went

i think it's all just a bit confusing/unclear - especially not speaking the language very well as for me the assumption that when my sim became active that the mega unlimited would be active at the same time was costly - but i guess that's what the italian lady may have been telling me..

at least i know for next visit, and i will make sure to topup to keep this sim active rather than go through the pain/cost again..

[cregaune]

But how does that explain my situation? I had a zero balance and a Mega No Limit package in operation. I wanted to cancel that and have enough credit to send an SMS message to do so, but when I added €15 the balance went to zero.

In your situation were you using data, using the sim, from the UK? Doesn't seem likely!

[Effendi]

@ ca-uk: you've been ripped off by the Wind dealer. They took you 30 euros for the sim-card (10€) plus a 20€ refill. But they didn't refill you...
Then you did the wrong thing (my girlfriend did it too a few days ago...): ALWAYS WAIT for the activation SMS before using data. So you lost your 5€ of credit. At that point you were at 0€, so you had to refill. You refilled with 15€ but you needed 20€ for the data option so you had to refill again and you are now with 10€. All correct.

@ cregaune: Mega No Limit, as all Wind data offers, recurs automatically every 30 days. It seems yours already recurred so it tried to take the 20€ from your credit, but you didn't have enough, as it happened to ca-uk too.

[ca-uk]

Am back home now - in the end, the three signal was more conistent than wind, so i needn't have wasted all that money on the wind card, but i will remember to top up before a year so i can keep it active as it's always better to have more sims..

[vegemite]

What's the moral of the story? When my wife and I arrive in Italy, we go to the Wind dealer (how do we find the store - search for Negazio Wind or something?) - get the SIMs and active the highest data package for the 10 days we are going around Italy, and WAIT for the activation SMS before doing ANY data on the phone? How long typically does the SMS take to arrive? We may as well just switch off the phones until then!

[Effendi]

You can find the shops here:
Wind - Privati - - Rivenditori

Then refill immediately with at least 10 euros and activate (ask the clerk) the option you NEED. I think the Internet No Stop would be more than enough for 10 days.
At the end you should pay:
- 10€ for the sim-card (including 5€)
- 10€ for the refill (or more, depends on you)
And you should remain with 6€ of credit after the Internet No Stop option is active.

Then you will receive 2 or 3 SMS. The first will tell you that they will activate you the option; the second should be the billing (9 euros for Internet no Stop) and the third the activation. WAIT for this one before connecting to internet. No need to keep the phone turned off (you won't receive any sms if you turn it off...).

[ca-uk]

What's the moral of the story? When my wife and I arrive in Italy, we go to the Wind dealer (how do we find the store - search for Negazio Wind or something?) - get the SIMs and active the highest data package for the 10 days we are going around Italy, and WAIT for the activation SMS before doing ANY data on the phone? How long typically does the SMS take to arrive? We may as well just switch off the phones until then!

My sim took 1d to activate, then a further 8h for the internet option to activate