I found three charges by WQ Long Distance on my credit card last month, each for $59.78. Suspicious, I started looking back and found more of these same charges, but by different companies, such as QX Telecommunications, and QX Telecom... All for $59.78, though there was one for $1.00. They were not consistent—sometimes they skipped a month or two, but they went back a year! When paying the bills, I assumed my husband had made the charges to fill up my daughter's AT&T calling card (she was overseas at the time) so I never checked up. The charges add up to over $400 so far.
Furious, I called the phone number listed on the credit card statement and got the same run around many of you did; "You ordered a 5,000 minute calling card... We have your voice authorization on file..." etc. I never ordered such a thing, and told the operator this, whereupon she started to ARGUE with me. I told her this was fraud and I want to speak to a supervisor. She said "Anyone else will tell you just what I did... We have to do an investigation.." Investigation? I let her know that I wanted to speak to her supervisor immediately, and she sullenly put me on hold. Then a very slick "floor manager" came on and told me that I would have to write to a Mr. Harris and gave me a P.O. Box address in CA., and that Mr. Harris did not respond to phone inquiries, only letters. He refused to give me the company's Federal EIN number.
I did some digging, and it looks really bad, folks. QX Telecom, LLC has a license in almost every state to "resell" telecommunications, and the principal of the company was sued by the FTC for $3.2M for consumer fraud under a different company name, WellQuest International, which is linked to some of your complaints.
They're still doing it, though, under these other names, and need to be stopped. QX Telecom made over $5 Million in sales in 2001 and over $30 Million in 2002. How much of this is out of our pockets and we didn't even know it? I have a feeling they are about to change names again.
I cancelled that credit card and sent a registered letter to "Mr. Harris" with a copy to my lawyer, the FTC and State Attorney General's office demanding immediate restitution. I also informed the credit card company of the issue, and sent them a detailed letter and request for back statements, then called the FTC and filed a formal complaint.
I need your help on my FTC complaint, and each of us needs to file a complaint with your state attorney general's office. Even if you got your money back from the company, this is still fraud, and there are possibly millions of innocent victims here. I'm a writer and intend to expose this fraud. If you can help, please contact me through the moderators of this forum.
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