A Dundee family is facing a dire Christmas after their young son unwittingly racked up a huge bill with online games.
Lesley Hastie was left unable to pay her mortgage or buy presents after being slapped with a shock £876 bill accumulated by 10-year-old Adam playing a football game on his Xbox Live account.
Lesley has had to borrow money to make it through what should have been a happy festive season.
Transactions on the online service do not require details or passwords to be entered once payment data is saved, allowing Adam to rack up costs without realising. Lesley, who also has a seven-year-old daughter, Amy, only found out when she tried to pay for groceries in a supermarket and her card was refused.
She said: “It’s just completely cleared out my account, which has hit everybody’s Christmas, including Amy.
“I can’t get any sense out of Adam, the best I can figure is he bought Fifa points without my permission.
“It’s terrible, especially at this time of year. That was all my money for my mortgage, which I now don’t have the money to pay, for food and presents.
“He knows what he did, he ran out last night and didn’t come back until late, and he is very much grounded.
“I’ve had a few problems recently and was just starting to get back on my feet and this has just put me right back to square one.”
Lesley is now keen to use her case to highlight how easy it is for devastating bills to mount quickly if young users are left unsupervised without password protection being in place.
She was extremely concerned with how her son could purchase so much so easily.
“There was no warning at all” she said. “I’m not sure he knows the value, so it isn’t really his fault but how was he able to charge so much to my account without my permission?
“It seems like there should be some sort of limit or warning, or require a password or something.
“It’s frustrating because I’ve found Microsoft very difficult to deal with and I can’t figure out how he did it.
“After something similar last year where I was charged £80 I asked them to remove my details from the account and they promised it couldn’t happen again but now it has.”
A Microsoft spokesman said: “Xbox offers some of the most advanced “family settings” in the entertainment industry.
“Our family settings enable parents and caregivers to configure and customise account settings for their children and teens, including whether premium content purchasing from Xbox stores is allowed.
“At Microsoft, we remain committed to continually enhancing parental controls and supporting public service efforts to educate parents.”
Microsoft, which owns Xbox, did not comment on whether the balance will be refunded to Lesle.