Mysteriously a 9.99 charge showed up on my wife's cell phone bill. With know knowledge of where this came from we contacted Verizon Wireless to investigate. Apparently the phone had been sent Premium Text Message from short code 99502. (Which we had never received OR requested)
In doing some digging I found the following:
http://usacomplaints.com/internet-services/sms4gamecheats-sgc-w/sms4gamecheats-sgc-web-servic-yd3cf.htm
Apparently all they need is your phone number. Doesn't matter how they get it, they can just make up number combinations and start sending out messages. You end up with a $10 charge out of nowhere.
The rep for Verizon said they couldn't do anything and that I would need to call the company at 1-877-244-7035. I did, and got the shadiest "customer service rep" ever. The guy was barely intelligible. After explaining my situation, he refused to credit my account. We went back and forth a few times with me eventually furious and he hung up. Every call I've tried to make since has also been hung up on.
I again tried to talk to a rep at Verizon to see if there was any way at all that they could help. The CSR said that she could not reverse the charge or call the company on my behalf, but that she could at least credit my account for half of the $10.
It blows my mind that I could get charged for something like this without any kind of authorization. And I'm frustrated at the fact that Verizon doesn't do much of anything to protect its customers from these kinds of things. I did have the rep put a Premium Text Message block on my phone so that this doesn't happen again, but still...
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