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Your Business Guide to Spend Caps

What is a Spend Cap?

A Spend Cap lets you set limits for your users on their out-of-bundle usage on things like premium, international calls or roaming usage. Add-ons are not included. You also have a £45 Data Roaming cap in place on all lines, as a precaution. 

How to set a monthly Spend Cap

Choose the maximum you’re willing to pay on top of your plan, and set it as your Spend Cap. You can also choose to switch the cap off completely.

It’s easy to set this up by logging onto your Three Business account, or using the Three app. Here’s how:

Three app steps

  1. Open the Three app
  2. If you’re not already logged in, select Go to account
  3. Press the three dots to open the menu
  4. From the menu select Manage Services
  5. Select Plan Settings
  6. Scroll down and select Yes, I want a Spend Cap
  7. Set your Spend Cap
  8. Scroll down and press Continue

Online Account steps

  1. Log into your account
  2. Click Manage Services
  3. Click Plan Settings
  4. Select Yes, I want a Spend Cap
  5. Set your Spend Cap
  6. Press Continue

If you have any problems setting up your Spend Cap, contact us. You can also visit your local Three store for help.

What’s included in a Spend Cap

Calls and texts:

  • After you’ve used up your monthly allowance
  • To premium rate and non-geographical numbers like 0845 and 0345
  • To international numbers from the UK – unless you have an Add-on
  • When roaming in a country that’s not a Go Roam destination
  • To non-EU countries from Go Roam in Europe destinations
  • To anywhere other than the UK from Go Roam Around the World destinations
  • Daily roaming charge

Data usage:

  • After you’ve used up your monthly data allowance
  • When roaming in a country that’s not a Go Roam destination
  • That exceeds our fair usage limits in Go Roam destinations

Go Roam:

Pay Monthly customers who joined or upgraded their plan on or after 1 October 2021, and are not on a Go Roam in Europe allowance, will incur a daily roaming charge to unlock their UK allowances for 24 hours in Go Roam destinations. The daily roaming charge is £2 in Go Roam in Europe destinations, and £5 in Go Roam Around the World destinations. The daily roaming charge is triggered as soon as you use any of your plan allowances in a Go Roam destination. More on daily roaming charges. 

Republic of Ireland and the Isle of Man are exempt from the daily roaming charge. Fair use policies apply.

The charge counts towards your Spend Cap, so if that’s set at zero, you won’t be able to use your UK allowances in Go Roam destinations.

If your Pay Monthly contract started before 1 October 2021, there’s no daily charge in Go Roam destinations. This means you can use Go Roam no matter which Spend Cap you choose. 

What’s not included:

  • Administrative charges for things like paper bills, copies of your bill, not paying by Direct Debit or other recurring methods
  • Your monthly plan charge, Add-ons, insurance etc.

No. You can change your Spend Cap as often as you’d like.

You and your team will receive a text to advise you when limits have been reached.

A Spend Cap gives you control over your monthly spend on calls, texts and data usage not included in your monthly plan.

The Spend Limit is an additional measure to prevent excessive spend on third party services. This includes:

  • Calls and texts to premium rate numbers
  • Premium rate or shortcode text messages
  • Paying for digital content using Three Pay

The limits are:

  • £40 per single transaction
  • £240 total charges per month

The Spend Limit is a legal requirement under the Payment Services Regulation. It can’t be removed or changed.

We’ll send a text notification if you’ve reached 80% of your monthly Spend Limit. Any transactions that exceed the Spend Limits will be blocked.

A Spend Cap lets you limit your spending on things not included in your monthly plan. This includes calls, texts and data usage whilst roaming.

The Data Roaming Limit is an additional measure to protect you from excessive data charges whilst roaming. If you’ve never asked us to change it, your Data Roaming Limit will be £45.

Reduced your Spend Cap to an amount lower than the current amount spent on your account? Your new, lower Spend Cap won’t take effect until your next bill cycle. And your current, higher Spend Cap will continue until then.

Or have you changed your Spend Cap to an amount higher than the current amount spent on your account? Your new Spend Cap will be available as soon as your request’s been processed – this usually only takes a few minutes. 

Increased your Spend Cap? Your new, higher cap will be available as soon as your request’s been processed – this usually only takes a few minutes.   

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