On July 27 I became a customer of Cleared Communications for their business unlimited plan, my bill averaged about $65.00 per month and I have been paying this company directly with a money order every since that time, on or about their due date for over two years then all of a sudden out of the clear blue sky, unbeknown to me on November 18 this company unauthorized charged my credit card for $64.71 and again on December 19 for $162.. 83 they had my credit card information on files since I initially signed up for their telephone service over two years ago, during that time I gave them a one time authorization to charge that credit card for my first payment only.
The credit card they fraudulently billed had expired on 10, I had actually forgotten that it existed since I hadn't used it since signing up for Cleared Communications telephone service on July or August.
I received a bill for their first fraudulent charge to my credit card of $64.71 in December I contacted the credit card company to dispute that charge made by Cleartel Communications, but as I stated above I had forgotten I had that credit card that they used to bill me for $64.71 so when calling the credit card company I thought that charge was on my other credit card account with them and gave them that account number, and I was told nothing was owed on that account, so I thought that was the end of the matter, until I received another bill in January from the credit card company for the second fraudulent charge of $162.83 that Cleartel Communications billed to that card on December 19 stating that my account was past due, that I have a minimum amount of $49.00 due, finance charges of 0.87, a late payment fee of $19.00, and a new balance of $247.41.
Also, I received a letter from the credit card company informing me of the fact that my credit card account was past due and that new charges to that credit card and other accounts I have with them will be declined. Consequently, this caused problems with getting my recurring bills to those other credit cards to be paid.
This is when I realize what had happened to create this mess. Once I realized the unauthorized use of my credit card, I immediately contacted the credit card company on January 06 to report it as fraudulent charges to my credit card and disputed all charges imposed on me by Cleartel Communications as fraudulent charges, I told the credit card company that I always paid that company directly with a money order for over two years. Those charges were put under investigation by the credit card company.
I also contacted Cleartel Communications that same date on January 06 to discuss how my bill had all of sudden got that high and why they had unauthorizedly charged my credit card for $227.54, before being connected with a customer service rep cleartel communications automatic voice system announced to me that my account with them had a current charge of $3,516.13 due January 28. The customer service rep told me that I had went over my 2000 long distance minutes and that I had never in the past went over those minutes, I informed him of that I have their business unlimited plan and my monthly usage had not change since inception of that plan. After hearing that announcement I initially thought that this was a billing issue mistake made by them, so I ask them to investigate it as such, I were giving billing issue ticket number 125182 then was told that it would take 3-5 business days for them to make a decision concerning the matter. Three days later I called them back regarding the billing issue problem and to my surprise I were told that they had closed the ticket, no explanation was giving but that all they could tell me is to investigate phone number 815-401-0005 because someone in my company is making a lot of intralata calls to that phone number. My reply was no one has access to the phone line but me and I never called that phone number. Without doing a full investigation as to whether this could have been a fraudulent usage issue, cleartel communications just closed out my billing issue ticket literally saying they can't do anything just pay this outrageous bill.
This company initially alleged that I owed them a total of $ 3,516.13 for their December and January invoice statement period. For invoice date 02/03 they claim I owe them $4,244.23 as of 03/03 invoice statement those changes are growing exponentially to the tune of $8,865.98, no local and long distance call summary explanation of how my bill mysteries jump $4.553.09 on that invoice in the detail of new charges it state last adjustments 02/19 return checks of $168.83 and $64.71 then 02/10 usage is $4,325.55. On 02/10 Cleartel Communications disconnected my telephone service.
Do you think that this is a co - incidence? I think not.
Before Cleared Communication fraudulently charged my credit card for $168.83 on 12/19, on or about 12/05 they put a long distance blocker on my long distance phone service. For what reason, there was no past due bills on my account with them and no apparent reason for them to charge my credit card especially in the time frame that they did it in nor should there have been a long distance blocker placed on my phone service by them, because according to them the calls were to phone number 815-401-0005 and 815-936-4592 location Kankakee, IL.intralata charges not Interstate charges a long distance blocker can only block Interstate long distance calls, not Intralata calls made in the same county I live in. This was done 17 days after the first fraudulent charge to my credit card of $64.71on November 18, 14 days before the second fraudulent charge to my credit card of $162.83 on December 19 and 23 days before the invoice due date on 12.28.
Those fraudulent charges to my credit card were for the December 03 invoice period, in which they claimed I owed them total new charges of $227.54 payment due date on 12/28. When Cleared Communications first fraudulently charged my credit card for $64.71 on November 18 this was done 38 days before December 03 due date on December 28. Their second fraudulent charges of $162.83 on December 19 was done 9 days before invoice due date on 12/28, one month and one day after the first fraudulent charges to my credit card for the same month of usage charges they were paid twice in the month of November, but they applied the $64.71 that they fraudulently charged to my credit card on November 18 to December 28 due date invoice period. Cleared Communications expected me to pay them $3,516.13 due January 28 but in the final analysis the total is $3,743.67 for both December and January invoice period.
Here's a little disclaimer in my self defense:
The obvious explanation for why such a drastic change in my monthly usages charges is that on or about November 18 Cleartel Communications Inc. Started planning a conspiracy to perpetrate fraudulent usages charges against my company to extort money from it, wanting payment for services that are clearly fraudulent usages charges.
I have proof from prior invoices and my welcome to Cleartel Communications letter, that 2000 free LD minutes was never printed on them until September did they business unlimited plan change to their new 2000 free long distance business unlimited plan, the business unlimited plan I signed up for over 2 years ago was for unlimited local and long distance services and that a bait and switch fraud was perpetrated. If this company wants to modify their business unlimited phone plan should they at least disclose the change of plan to their customer before they modify it.
The reason why I never went over 2000 LD minutes in the last past 2 years, is because there wasn't any long distance minutes limit on the business unlimited plan I initially signed up for.
Invoice date 11/03 and prior has no Intralata calls listed on invoice nor in the local and long distance summary, the only legitimate calls on this invoice are the Interstate and Intrastate dates calls were placed are correct for invoice period, therefore billing is correct.
Fraudulent usage charges was accessed to my account for invoice date 12/03 for 14 Intralata charges the dates and time of calls are bogus, they are dated 09/27 to 09/29 with usage minutes of 4147.3 that's 2147.3 minutes over their so called 2000 free LD minutes none of those September Intralata usage charges shouldn't be on this invoice statement closing date on 12/03. The only valid calls on that invoice statement are the 5 Interstate calls dated from 11/06 to 11/12.
According to the 12/03 invoice statement no calls were made in the month of October, that's because they are listed on the 11/03 invoice statement, that is an appropriate invoice billing of my actual monthly usage charges and that's exactly where they should be listed, calls are dated 10/08 to 10/15.
The same fraudulent monthly usage charges were accessed to my account for the invoice statement date 01/03 for 173 Intralata usage charges, this one takes the cake there's a monthly usage charge of $3,336.13 and 47659.0 minutes used dated from 11/27 to 01/02 this is one month & six days of monthly usage charges, that's 45659.0 minutes over their so called 2000 freed LD minutes.intralata calls number 1-16 dated November 27,28, 29, and 30 are bogus total usage charges with 4560.8 minutes and shouldn't be on this invoice statement they should be on invoice statement dated 12/03 due date 12/28. The only valid calls are 2 Interstate 3.1 minutes and 2 Intrastate 1.2 minutes dated 12/04 number 34 37.
According to their invoice statement date 02/03 there were a total of 95 calls made, 13 to 815-401-0005 from 01/02 to 01/06 82 of those calls were made to a new phone number 815-936-4592 with total minutes of 10001.1, a cost of $728.10 and a total due of $4,244.23 on 02/28. None of those calls are my monthly valid usages calls.
According to their invoice statement date 03/03 2 calls on 02/03 was made, no cost for calls made but I owe Cleared Communications an adjustment charge of $4,553.09 for usage charges on 02/10, with a total due of $8,865.98 no explanation of why or how the charges just sky rocket up to that dollar amount. Well, this is out of nowhere it's unreasonable where did they get this? As I Stated above on 02/10 my telephone service was disconnected by Cleartel Communications, Inc.
According to their invoice date 04/03, I now owe them $9,003.97 due 04/28
In Conclusion:
This is blatant fraud! I hadn't put 2 and 2 together until January 9 that this company called Cleartel Communications Inc. Is trying to railroad me into paying them an outrageous bill, what I do not say to you today about this company is up to you to connect the dots. Are you starting to get the feeling that some type of conspiracy is taking place here! If you are not you should be.
Intentionally or unintentionally this is plain old unfair business practices, they violated federal laws and regulations that prevent unfair business practices in consumers protection laws. I had been a customer of this company since October and this is the first problem I have had with them, I no longer have trust in this company
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