Phone scam "cramming" - beware

[Dave01]

This phone scan is not new, but it just happened to me so I figured I'd provide a warning to those who don't know about it.

I received my AT&T phone bill (land line) last week. The amount due was unusually high so I looked further. It turns out I was charged $14.95 by a third party company for voicemail service. The name of the company is American Evoice. When I called the company to complain, they said I signed up for their service through some website. This was simply not true. They claim that they will credit the charges back to AT&T (me) but I'm not going to hold my breath.

As I did some research, I found that this can happen a few ways. First, apparently by signing up for certain online coupons, sweepstakes, or other offers, you are agreeing to their service (supposedly in the fine print). I do not sign up for such things. The second way, and the worse in my opinion, is anyone who has your name address and phone number can sign you up for these services (at least through AT&T)! The phone company does not have to verify the validity of the charge to pass it through to the customer. Theoretically, someone could sit down with a phone book and sign people up for these services (or they my be doing it themselves).

It seems that there is very little consumers can do to prevent this. Not having a land line phone is probably the best option (it's not clear if the same thing can be done to cell numbers). The other is to request a third party bill block on your number. This is supposed to prevent any third party service from billing through your provider. I did this today with AT&T (although a different AT&T rep told a co-worker that they cannot do this...at this point I don't know who is right).

I have reported this company to every agency I could find (BBB, FTC, FCC, TX Atty Gen.). Please check your phone bills carefully.

Dave

[cmartinez95]

Thanks for the info. My landline bill is always within 10 cents of the previous month's bill so something like this would catch my attention QUICKLY!
Does ATT charge for the "3rd party billing" block service? If I know them, then the answer is most likely YES.

[longtooth]

Thanks from here too. WE do not have long distance on our land line so our bill is as above - the same every month.

[RKirby]

This phone scan is not new, but it just happened to me so I figured I'd provide a warning to those who don't know about it.

I received my AT&T phone bill (land line) last week. The amount due was unusually high so I looked further. It turns out I was charged $14.95 by a third party company for voicemail service. The name of the company is American Evoice. When I called the company to complain, they said I signed up for their service through some website. This was simply not true. They claim that they will credit the charges back to AT&T (me) but I'm not going to hold my breath.

As I did some research, I found that this can happen a few ways. First, apparently by signing up for certain online coupons, sweepstakes, or other offers, you are agreeing to their service (supposedly in the fine print). I do not sign up for such things. The second way, and the worse in my opinion, is anyone who has your name address and phone number can sign you up for these services (at least through AT&T)! The phone company does not have to verify the validity of the charge to pass it through to the customer. Theoretically, someone could sit down with a phone book and sign people up for these services (or they my be doing it themselves).

It seems that there is very little consumers can do to prevent this. Not having a land line phone is probably the best option (it's not clear if the same thing can be done to cell numbers). The other is to request a third party bill block on your number. This is supposed to prevent any third party service from billing through your provider. I did this today with AT&T (although a different AT&T rep told a co-worker that they cannot do this...at this point I don't know who is right).

I have reported this company to every agency I could find (BBB, FTC, FCC, TX Atty Gen.). Please check your phone bills carefully.

Dave

The same thing happened to me a few days ago, but in my case the company was "My Voicemail Network", aka mvn.com out of San Diego, CA. A company called Enhanced Services Billing out of San Antonio ( a known crammer and a company with quite a reputation for shady dealings) is the company that handles the AT&T billing on behalf of mvn.com.

It seems that my wife unintentionally "subscribed" to this service by printing a grocery coupon of some kind at a coupon site called "eversave.com". Apparently by downloading this coupon you also agree to subscribe to this service. The "agreement", if you could call it that, is buried very deeply in the fine print where it is unlikely that you would ever see it.

I also called AT&T and complained about the unauthorized charges to my phone bill and was told that they had no control over it. They are required by FCC regulations to pass these charges through to the consumer. After doing a little internet research it appears that this is indeed the case.

After several attempts to contact Enhanced Services Billing and getting nowhere (surprise!), I called My Voicemail Network and demanded an immediate halt to the voicemail service that I didn't even know that I had and a refund for all charges. They apologized and promised to credit my AT&T bill for the full amount, but did say that it may take two billing cycles to take effect. I promised them that I would be back in touch to recover the additional two months of "service" also if that indeed turned out to be the case.

What gets my dander up about this whole episode is the fact that this has been going on for several years now with the full knowledge and apparent sanction of the feds. A little time spent in your favorite search engine will reveal more than you can read in a lifetime about this scam. In fact, Enhanced Services has already been sued (by the FTC if I remember correctly) and settled at least one case only to turn around and continue business exactly as they had in the past.

We'll see what happens next.

I guess the moral of this story is: read the fine print before you click.

[stevie_d_64]

Good stuff...Thanks for the heads up...

So we go ahead and put a "third party" billing block on our land line account...Maybe even our mobile accounts (might as well try that too, just to see if you can)...

And I would call the Texas AG's office to file a complaint anyway...Just because...

[Dave01]

The same thing happened to me a few days ago, but in my case the company was "My Voicemail Network", aka mvn.com out of San Diego, CA. A company called Enhanced Services Billing out of San Antonio ( a known crammer and a company with quite a reputation for shady dealings) is the company that handles the AT&T billing on behalf of mvn.com.

Enhanced Service Billing Inc (ESBI). is the same company American Evoice used to pass the charges through to my phone bill. There seems to be a number of companies that run this scam (American Evoice, ILD, MVN), but they all have one thing in common...ESBI. I have not yet reported ESBI as I cannot confirm an address for them (required for the complaint).

One additional note that makes this even more troubling (and illegal) is the fact that I don't believe they even supplied the service they were billing me for. I never received a phone call, letter, e-mail, etc. welcoming me or explaining how to use their service. This billing behavior does seem to be allowed by the FCC/FTC however, it's not clear they understand that no service is actually being provided, at least as far as I can tell. This may be a better approach to take with the TX Atty. Gen. (especially with ESBI being located in TX).

Dave

[RKirby]

Enhanced Service Billing Inc (ESBI). is the same company American Evoice used to pass the charges through to my phone bill. There seems to be a number of companies that run this scam (American Evoice, ILD, MVN), but they all have one thing in common...ESBI. I have not yet reported ESBI as I cannot confirm an address for them (required for the complaint).

Here ya go..........

Enhanced Services Billing
10500 Heritage Blvd Ste 200
San Antonio, TX 78216
Phone: (210) 949-7000

Good luck with your complaint. I can't even express my total contempt and disgust for scum bag companies like this without violating the rules and spirit of this forum.

I'd like to pay them a visit in person. On second thought that probably wouldn't be the smart thing to do, know what I mean?