Why is my bill higher than normal?

Picture messages aren’t included in your standard plan – there’s a fixed price for each one you send. Some phones may classify a text message as a picture message simply because it includes an emoji.

These charges will appear on your bill in the picture messages section.

If you send a lot of these types of messages you may want to buy add-ons which give you an allowance every month to send picture messages at reduced rates. You can check out the prices in our:

> pay as you go price guide

> pay monthly price guide 

When do devices convert text messages to picture messages?

This can happen when:

- you’re using iPhone Messages and sending features and effects to a non-iPhone user, or when iMessage is unavailable

- your text includes a non-standard smiley or symbol such as an emoticon, emoji, or iPhone X's Animojis

- your text is sent to an email address instead of a phone number

- you're sending a group text message

- your text exceeds the character limit (on some phones this is 160 characters, on others it can be higher)

- your message has a subject line

Sending an MMS instead of an SMS text message is down to the phone you’re using, the messaging platform and the person you’re sending to. It’s not because of the EE network.

Here are some common reasons for one-off charges on your bill (these will appear as extra charges in My EE).

Please note: If you started your contract with EE on or after 1 March 2017, you might see a 'Price Rise Discount' on your bill. This is to ensure your bill is at the price you agreed for your contract. It will appear on every bill for the rest of your contract.

Device charges and credits

If you’ve upgraded, unlocked your phone or paid towards a new device on your plan you may see some one-off charges on your bill: 

You can find the amount you paid when you ordered your device on page one of your bill or by logging on to My EE.

Voted on a TV talent show? Entered a competition on your phone? Texted a donation to charity? Subscribed to an information service?

If so, you’re likely to see charges on your bill from other companies.

Why have I been charged?

You’ve requested a service, votes, entered a competition or bought digital content and agreed that these charges be applied to your EE bill.

These are not EE services and are charged by the company that provided them. 

What have I been charged for?

Don’t recognise a charge showing under 'Services from other companies' on your bill? Just enter the three to nine digit number shown on your bill in the 'number' column in our charge checker or the service description exactly as it appears on your bill, just before the cost of the service. This will be prefixed with one letter for example 'W Service Name'. DO NOT enter the 9 digit number shown under 'reference' on your bill – it won’t work.

Paying for apps and tracks

You can add the cost of buying apps and tracks to your monthly bill or your pay as you go credit.

But this is only if your phone uses a Google, Nokia, Windows or BlackBerry App store.

> Find out more

> For more on third party services, read our Charge to Mobile Code of Practice

Part charges will show on your bill if you make a change to your account part-way through your billing month. 

Your charging periods should be back to normal next month, provided there are no further changes.

If you’ve bought something from your phone’s app store and it appears on your bill, it’s because the item’s been charged to your EE account instead of your debit or credit card.

Is there a purchase limit?

Yes, any amount over £15 will be charged to your credit or debit card, not your EE account.

Questions or issues with your app purchases  

You’ll need to contact your phone app store or the app developer directly. You can find their contact
details by logging into your app store account.

To prevent any unwanted purchases from app charging, we advise that you set a PIN on your app store account.

What happens if I get a refund?

Refunds for apps you’ve bought will be given to you as credit to spend on future apps, not as a credit for your EE bill.

The breakdown of charges on your bill is always shown without VAT.

The VAT charge is calculated under VAT in My EE or on the first page of your paper bill.

Any charges on your account not subject to VAT will show on the first page of your paper bill as VAT charged at 0% or VAT exempt.

VAT invoices

If you need a VAT invoice of your payments, please let us know. There’s a charge per invoice requested – see our non-standard price guide

Deposits

There are two types of security deposits you could be asked to pay: 

Both are called Deposit for Service on your bill.

Getting your deposit back

We’ll refund your deposit automatically via your current payment method once you've built up a good payment history with us. Payment of your bills by the due date every month will help this.