Schumer Fights Phone Bill Mystery Charges
by MEREDITH TRAINA | wpix.com

3:29 p.m. EST, March 7, 2010
NEW YORK (WPIX)—
Sen. Charles Schumer is calling on the Federal Trade Commission (FCC) to put an end to "cramming" phone charges -- charges made to consumers' and small business' phone bills that they did not order.

Recent reports suggest that New Yorkers are seeing a rise in suspicious charges on their phone bills that they never agreed to. Often times, it takes more than one complaint to get those bogus charges removed.

"Consumers and businesses are being swindled by cramming charges and it's time to put a stop to it," Schumer said. "Cramming is an annoying scam that is not only costing people thousands of dollars in bogus fees, but countless hours of valuable time trying to get those charges removed. During these tough economic times, it is more important than ever that we take every possible step to address these types of costly scams."

The New York democrat also said phone bills have become so complex that most people don't even notice the charges. Crammers rely on misleading or vague service descriptions like "service fee," "calling plan" or "minimum monthly usage fee" to sneak bogus charges into already confusing phone bills.

A loophole in phone deregulation allows scammers to tack on these mystery charges with no questions asked. It primarily occurs when phone companies add new third-party services to a customers bill without their notification or approval.

Schumer now asking the FTC to aggressively pursue any third party company found to be adding charges onto phone bills without customer notification and agreement. He's also calling on the FCC, which regulates the phone companies, to draw up new rules that require notification before any new charge is added to a phone bill.

The FTC received over 3,000 complaints over the last year regarding unauthorized charges on telephone bills, including landline, mobile wireless, and VoIP services.