Virgin Mobile hands over control of spending caps to customers

Virgin Mobile is making it easier for customers to track their spending, switching on the ability to implement spending caps to stop them going outside of their included minutes, texts and data limits.

Pay monthly customers can specify a spending cap, from 0 to 100 so they will never go over what they can afford. If they start approaching their spending cap, Virgin Mobile will send them a text message making them aware that they're about to go over their free limits. The customer will get another text message if they reach the limit.

The Spending Caps feature is available from the Virgin Mobile app - as long as you're either a new or upgrading customer. If you're stuck in your contract for a while yet, you'll have to wait until you're due for an upgrade before you can add the feature to your account.

Other new features of the revamped Virgin Mobile App include details of the customer's current plan, the ability to buy add-ons and get support from Virgin's customer services team. Later this year, the telecoms company will introduce additional features such as in-app messaging with customer service advisors for on-the-go support.

Virgin Mobile also revealed it is going to increase the speed of its data from 50Mbps to 70Mbps, giving customers another reason to stay with the telecoms company.

"Spending Caps have been high on our customers' wish list for some time, so we are pleased to be able to start introducing them now," Jeff Dodds, managing director of Virgin Mobile said. "Combined with our freshly updated app and even faster 4G speeds, we're giving our customers a fast and flexible service with more control and peace of mind than ever before."

Clare Hopping
Freelance writer

Clare is the founder of Blue Cactus Digital, a digital marketing company that helps ethical and sustainability-focused businesses grow their customer base.

Prior to becoming a marketer, Clare was a journalist, working at a range of mobile device-focused outlets including Know Your Mobile before moving into freelance life.

As a freelance writer, she drew on her expertise in mobility to write features and guides for ITPro, as well as regularly writing news stories on a wide range of topics.