When I got my phone bill I was shocked to find out that I was expected to pay $1.19 per minute for an in-state call for a total of $80.92 (90.11 after tax) My assigned long distance carrier is AT&T, but I haven't used them for literally years. I use the 10-10-987 number, plus make very few long distance calls on my home phone. On this particular call, my husband just picked up the phone and dialed 1 the number, and AT&T should have picked up the call.
My problem, however doesn't technically involve the phone companies I use, it involves USBI, a billing company.
USBI did the billing for this call, and on my phone bill they say "Billed on Behalf of NATIONWIDE PRO TEL" So I called USBI and the first person (Ruth) that I talked to was sweet as can be. She quickly told me she could "re-rate" the charge, and did. I was extremely impressed since after she worked her magic I was to pay only $11.24 tax. GREAT DEAL!
My problem started when I asked who NATIONWIDE PRO TEL was, and for the next hour I called a total of 10 different customer service persons from 4 different companies, Valor (my local company) AT&T, MCI and USBI. I even spoke to a Veronica in Argentina! Really! No one could identify NATIONWIDE PRO TEL. I even tried 1-800 information at the urging of an AT&T employee. The eleventh Customer service representive I got was Victor (employee # 1625) from USBI. He was instantly rude to me and informed me that the charges were not taken off. That I owed the full amount. When I assured him that Ruth had already taken the charges off, he told me otherwise in no uncertain terms. He also told me that USBI did not put "billed on behalf of NATIONWIDE PRO TEL" on my bill even though it was there in black and white on USBI's portion of the bill.
Evidently I do not have the right to contact the company that has the audacity to expect me to pay $1.19 per minute for long distance. I can't help to think that USBI's reluctance to own up to the fact that they did bill on behalf of NATIONWIDE PRO TEL screams SCAM!
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