Wednesday, March 25, 1998

CRAMMERS SUED

Last week, Illinois Attorney General Jim Ryan charted new ground in his state by suing a third-party billing company for its role in "cramming" Illinois consumers. Cramming is when companies illegally place charges on consumers' phone bills for optional services that they never ordered, such as paging, voice mail and personal 800 numbers. Some companies, or "service providers," use other companies called "billing aggregators" to arrange for billing and collection. The aggregators, in turn, contract with the consumers' local telephone companies to place the charges on their bills.

While Ryan's agency has sued several service providers, this is the first action it has taken against an aggregator. According to the charges, International Telemedia Associates, Inc., continued to bill consumers for unauthorized charges even after they complained to the company that they never ordered them.

"Consumers who had been crammed repeatedly called this billing company to complain," Ryan said. "We're alleging that this billing company knew or should have known that consumers were being defrauded by its service providers and yet continued to bill consumers -- essentially helping to cram them."

The Illinois Attorney General also sued eight service providers last week, accusing them of:

• billing consumers for services and demanding payment when they knew or should have known that consumers did not order them;

• billing consumers for services that were never provided;

• placing charges on phone bills that did not identify the nature of the services allegedly rendered;

• representing to consumers that charges would not be removed, failing to do so, and continuing to bill for them.

Don't sign contest entry forms or respond to offers for calling cards or other incentives without checking to make sure that you're not agreeing to other unwanted purchase services as well.

Look at your bill closely every month. In the pages showing the bill details, charges for optional services should be itemized and the name of the billing company should be listed along with its toll-free number. If you did not authorize the services, call the number and insist that they be canceled and the charges removed. If the crammer agrees, let your local telephone company know. If it refuses or you can't get through, tell your local carrier that you're disputing the charges. Be sure to pay your bill on time, subtracting the disputed amount and any taxes or fees associated with it. Your phone service should not be disconnected, but be aware that the crammed charges can be referred to a collection agency.

You should also report cramming to your state Attorney General and the Federal Communications Commission.

If you have any questions or would like to report and incident, call NCL's National Fraud Information Center at 1-800-876-7060 or use one of our online forms.

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