Corporate extortion

July 25, 2005 6:07 PM

Advice needed on resolving what I consider essentially an attempt at extortion by Vesta Corporation (processors for prepaid Cingular cellphones).

I have a very nice Cingular cellphone (costs about $250) which I use relatively infrequently but for important calls when I do use it. So I am a prepaid subscriber rather than on a monthly plan. A week ago my cellphone was essentially shut down; I can not longer refill my phone with a credit/debit card or on the website.

The reason? A few months ago a friend used my cellphone to make some calls while she was moving across town. In return, she added some minutes to the phone with her credit card. No problem. Apparently something like two years ago when she was in New York she borrowed her daughter's cell phone for a week and added some minutes to that phone in return. Again, no problem.

The problem? Recently someone else in New York added some minutes to that phone with a credit card and then refused the charges. So they shut my phone down and will not turn it on until I pay those charges, despite my never having been within 2000 miles of the phone or having met the person or people involved. Again, to be clear, the refused charges were on neither my phone nor my credit card, nor on my friend's credit card.

Can they really hold me responsible for refused charges on a phone I have never seen by a person I have never met? I spent two full hours on the phone today and have gotten no satisfaction. I've called both Cingular (who were relatively helpful but don't handle the prepaid themselves) and Vesta (who very much were not helpful). For example, I was refused a managed at Vesta until I said I was recording the call and asked point blank "So you are denying me the opportunity to speak to your manager?"... at which point I was offered a transfer to some voice mail.

How do I deal with this?

posted by Justinian to shopping (9 comments total)

Why would you want to keep the calling plan after this? You still have the phone, find another provider and keep your number.
posted by 517 at 6:13 PM on July 25, 2005

I would recommend dealing with it as politely and cordially as possible. Outrage doesn't go as far over the phone as we'd all like to believe. If you express your extreme desire to keep your phone service, and clarify the relationships involved here, you should eventually be able to get high enough up the ladder to a kind soul.

I should clarify, I am not accusing you of being rude to these people. I'm advising you to be utterly polite and kind. I think that most customer service phone people are so surprised by being treated nicely that they just feel like helping you out.
posted by MrZero at 6:40 PM on July 25, 2005

Call your state attorney general's office (or look at their website, etc.) for advice on dealing with inappropriate collections practices.
posted by winston at 6:45 PM on July 25, 2005

Justinian,

HearUsNow.org (a project of Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports) has a page on how to complain about cellphone service.

You're already a few steps ahead of the game, but people sometimes get good results after complaining to the AG or the FCC (the FCC forwards those to the carrier--but since Cingular doesn't seem willing to make it right, it might end up in the blackhole there). Your state regulators are useless here (thanks Powell's FCC!).

In my experience with cellphone carriers, 517, they won't let pre-paid consumers port numbers in or out--meaning that it might not be your number to take with you. And even if you were able to, you might have problems trying to move the number to Liberty Wireless, Sprint, T-Mobile or Verizon as Vesta is the recharge provider to these companies--you'd likely be in the same boat.

Vesta is just the payment processor--and it covers any losses for the carrier, so of course they're going to try to make it up from you. Doesn't mean it's right though. This sucks, and the FCC wants to take this situation from bad to worse.

Cingular has the power to make this better if it gets high enough--something that probably won't happen with a phone call. Seriously, e-mail and a paper letter copy is a great way to get results.

I would keep laying on Vesta, and get to writing a letter that will go to Cingular, Vesta, the FCC, your AG, your state regulator and even Consumers Union's share your story. You're already halfway there.

Good luck.
posted by kenneth at 8:25 PM on July 25, 2005

I second winstons advice. I was in a similar situation for about 6-8 months with the old AT&T Wireless (before they were acquired by Cingular) and had spent over 40 hours on various phone calls trying to get it resolved. I finally got fed up and contacted my atty general through a web form. Within a week I had a high level AT&T rep (one who actually had the power to do something) call me and fix the problem in 15 minutes. I wished I had contacted the AG months earlier.

Otherwise, dropping the service and contracting with someone else is another good idea, as long as you don't mind punting on whatever sort of credits you had left on the account.
posted by freshgroundpepper at 8:50 PM on July 25, 2005

I would contract with someone else but, as Kenneth says, Vesta handles the payments for most of the big carriers. I'll still explore that route if nothing happens via letters. I just hate to have a cool 6 month old $250 paperweight.

I've now spent some time with a Cingular customer service manager who actually dialed into Vesta and talked to the Vesta "specialist" while I was on the line. He was (as MrZero suggests) unfailingly polite but very firm and insistent and went through a whole litany with the Vesta rep.... bottom line, I have a call in to the specialist manager (she wasnt in the office today) and two addresses to write to, one at Cingular and one at Vesta. I'll be mailing out to both of them as soon as I hear from the specialist manager at Vesta.

The AG etc info is helpful. I'll include that if the specialist manager is not cooperative. There is simply no way they should be asking me to pay money over a charge that was not initiated by me or anyone who has used my phone and which occured 2500 miles away on a phone I never used by a person I never met. It's insane.

Thanks for the helpful advice.
posted by Justinian at 9:15 PM on July 25, 2005

Why would you want to keep the calling plan after this? You still have the phone, find another provider and keep your number.

Make sure your phone is compatible, first (unlocked etc). If you can, do this.
posted by angry modem at 10:40 PM on July 25, 2005

If you do decide to ditch them and find another provider remember that you're still going to have to fight to keep these unpaid charges off your credit report.
posted by DBAPaul at 12:28 PM on July 26, 2005

I can't imagine they can touch my credit for something so unrelated to me. If they try... well, they better be ready to throw down, baby. It's on!
posted by Justinian at 10:04 PM on July 26, 2005