A pregnant nursery nurse has been charged over £1,500 by Three for a contract which should have ended 10 years ago. 

Abigail Lane, 30, made the discovery after realising she was receiving five bills through the post when there were only four devices in the house. 

On contacting the mobile network she was horrified to learn that she was still paying the money for a contract she had taken out for a dongle - a portable internet gadget - that she had been assured was due to end in 2010.

In total, she has been overcharged £1,530 over the nine-year period. 

Abigail, from Liverpool, told the ECHO: "I can't believe that this has happened.

"I couldn't believe that for all this time they had been taking this money."

Early into the contract with Three, Abigail had realised that she had no need for the dongle.

She contacted the mobile network in order to end the contract and agreed to pay it until it finished. 

The nursery nurse said: "I was reassured at the time that it had been cancelled." 

Three has been quick to admit its mistake and yet just under two months after the discovery was made, she says she is yet to be repaid. 

Abigail is six months pregnant and is now facing bank charges after going overdrawn on her account.

She said: "I am due to give birth in three months. This is money that is mine and that I need."

Her father William McKay said: "She's not at all happy about it because the bank are threatening her with more bank charges and that's money she would never get back. She's very worried about this."

Abigail has been in repeated contact with the phone network, but she has faced numerous delays despite the promise from the network that her money would be returned.

She said: "I'm pregnant, I work five days a week, I don't have time to sit on the phone for hours. My dad has had to sit for hours with them and he doesn't have the time either."

Describing the process of getting the money back, Abigail said: "I am ending up late for work because I'm on the phone to them. It's like fighting a losing battle to get my own money back."

Her family pay all their phone bills out of one account and this meant that she did not realise that £15 coming out of her account each month was the long expired dongle contract. 

Statistics show that today millions of people are paying hundreds of millions pounds on phone contracts that have already expired.

Research by the Citizens Advice suggests that on average customers are being overcharged around £22 month, with elderly people being particularly vulnerable to this.

A Three spokesperson said:  "We're sorry to hear that this experience has caused Mrs Lane distress. The refund will be issued within the next 10 days with an additional £70 as a gesture of goodwill."