Did you know that any company can just add a ten dollar charge to your phone bill?

I had a charge for $9.99 added to my bill without my permission. I called AT&T. They said that any company can add any charge to your bill at any time without my knowledge or permission. If I have never sent a single text message to anyone, let alone this random company, they can still charge my bill without my permission.

I only noticed because my credit card expired and I went online to put in the new expiration date and decided to look through my bill while I was at it. It’s been on there for months.

I checked the incoming and outgoing text messages for the line. Two months ago my sister-in-law (on my “family plan”) RECEIVED three text messages from this company. She never replied. She did not sign up or “activate” anything.

The woman I spoke to at AT&T was very friendly and helpful and informed me that this was standard operating procedure for AT&T. She said that many customers call in to complain and that AT&T had a policy of refunding all unauthorised charges when the customers complain and can block accounts from using the “feature”. However, AT&T has since changed this policy. Now, only 90 days worth of charges may be refunded.

The moral of the story? Fuck AT&T. and check your bill.

UPDATE: Ars Technica has a story about this practice and how “crammers” can make quite a bit of money off it. http://arst.ch/fwv