My daughter's blackberry started acting up and the arrows were constantly flashing. She didn't know what was going on and it was draining her battery. Would happen even after a reboot, and she has no apps and just reads email.

I told her to turn it off until she gets home so I can look at it (she is in another city). It turned out that she was visiting NY this past weekend and left the data service turned off all the time, except few times when she wanted to check for emails. During those brief times, the phone transmitted 60MB and at $8/MB when in the US it came to $250 of data charges.

I called Bell and they told me to speak to technical service. They had us reload the phone from scratch but it is still happening. They said I'll have to send it in for service (still under warranty).

Any chance Bell will refund the $250? I asked, and they are non-committal. They said it is still unbilled usage so they can't do anything.. and they need the Bell Store to look at the phone.

Anyone with a similar experience?

What Model of BB?
It's most likely an application running in the background sending data.

- First off, Do a battery pull and see if that re-sets the device. (Assuming you all ready did that)
- If that doesn't work, remove all applications then Re-Add them one at a time. There is a good chance that there is an application that is running in the background sending data back and fourth (I've had the "WeatherEye" app go on like that once).
- If that doesn't work Re-Load the BB OS from scratch and see if that solves your problem. -Edit, Bell had you do that. Did they restore you to a backup with Applications and Contacts?

In terms of your Roaming Data, Bell may reduce it but there is no way they are going to reverse the charges. It is the users responsibility to ensure that "Data when Roaming" is off in the network settings to prevent nasty Data charges. Personally I have my BB locked to the Rogers network so as soon as the signal is gone, I have no service (preventing me from getting any Voice/Txt/Data charges). But if you send it to Bell and prove there was a problem, they could reverse the charges based on a defective device.

Even after a a complete reload the phone was constantly transmitting data. I looked at the data logs on line, and in 7 days, it transmitted almost 2 GIG of data. 320MB in the US = $1800. And that doesn't include the 700MB over the 500MB plan in Canada.

I have been in contact with more senior people who are looking in to the cell tower data logs. This phone is haunted or something. There is no way I'm paying that much for a fault in the phone or their network. My daughter's usual monthly activity is 6MB. She only uses it for email - no web browsing. She has no other apps loaded on the phone.

They are going to get back to me with their investigation. I'm already preparing my arguments for small claims court should I need to sue them.