I received my SBC phone bill and immediately knew something was amiss. My phone bill is usually approximately $22 a month. I opened my current bill and it was $35.96.
There was a collect call from Mexico at 2:51 P.M. On 10/18/05, phone # 526677262561. I was not at home on that day at that time. I do not accept collect calls or make long distance calls on my home phone.
The charge for the call was $13.63 billed by OAN Services, Inc. With a number listed for them as 1-800-441-9678.
I phoned SBC to dispute the charge. As I was doing this, my son looked up OAN and saw an area titled "Rip-Off". There was a Marvin in Newcomb, NY who explained in a letter about receiving a charge for a collect call from Connecticut and how he doesn't accept collect calls, etc.
I read this letter to the SBC customer service staff. The staff member stated they had received one on their phone bill in September also collect from Mexico, and the area they are in is not serviced by SBC. The staff person removed the charge from my bill and is sending it back to OAN Services.
I stated to the staff person, that if this became a regular occurrence, that I would cancel my hard line phone and just use my cell phone.
It appears OAN believes it can tack on a $13.63 charge to a bill here, and a $7.78 charge in the case of Marvin, and another charge to a bill somewhere else and people won't notice the charge and just pay them. Unfortunately for them, there are those of us who do not have 2 or 3 pages of long distance calls and collect calls each month, we have none, so we catch them at their scam.
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