I noticed on my monthly ATT phone bill that I was being assessed a third party charge for "SOLO Communications Voice Mail monthly fee". Apparently, ATT is legally obligated by the FCC to process third party charges, so I had to contact the company separately and received a rather ridiculous story... They immediately said they would reverse the charges and cancel my "account". Their willingness to reverse these charges without asking me any questions or looking into the situation seemed very suspicious to me (not that the whole situation wasn't suspect to begin with!). I asked for further details about these charges and they explained that they offer a service where people can set up a 800 voice mail account online and it appeared as though someone named Britney Taylor "must have made a typo" when she entered the phone number for charging her monthly service fee. I naturally asked why - if they were a reputable and legitimate company, and not in fact scamming people - they wouldn't have validated the phone # provided with the actual name and address associated with that phone # (which would be me, not Britney) before setting up an account and processing the charges. They then explained that their computer validation system must have been down that day (how convenient) and it unfortunately slipped through the cracks, "but don't worry, this is a very rare occurrence and we have reversed your charges". I then did some research online and found that this has happened to a lot of people with the same company. Great scam for them - they get the benefit of receiving their service fee without any verification process whatsoever and only need to reverse it when/if a smart consumer notices the fraudulent charges!
Notbritneytaylor
Chicago, Illinois
U.S.A.
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