We've been Crammed!
@3SnuggleBunnies (16374)
United States
November 21, 2010 1:10pm CST
I recently received my bill for my landline + dsl and there was a charge that was not something we authorized. It was from some place called OAN Services Inc. for some streaming radio subscription neither of us authorized nor heard of. I had called hubby yesterday while he was at work to double check & had not heard from him all day. So I did my own snooping online and found that this company is natorious for "cramming" and the jist of what cramming is that this fraud company has your phone company attach a billing from them (a 3rd party) to your monthly phone bill. Then they hope you just pay the bill and not notice the extra charge to your plan. Or if you'd like a full definition here the link from the FCC http://www.fcc.gov/cib/consumerfacts/cramming.html
Hubby said he will take care of it on Monday while the kids are at school. Sadly this is the 2nd time something like this had happened to us. A few years back we had some oddball company charge us for internet service off our phone bill! Not amused to be paying for 2 internet services on the same bill.
Now if you also look online for the company I mentioned there are TONS of complaints for them for various services charged to people on their phone bills w/o proper authorization from YOU! I encourage you to search and look at those complaints so that you can see what schemes they pull on unknowing consumers. Even as little as doing little quizes or clicking on a banner can bring you to these SCAMMERS! So beware & that's my PSA for today :0)
1 person likes this
10 responses
@SomeCowgirl (32189)
• United States
3 Jul 11
it is just disgusting what people will do to earn a few bucks! That is a form of security fraud right there and I'd be outraged! I don't have a landline, just a cellphone but if there is a charge I'm not certain of you bet I will look into it. My cellphone company charges me to pay them basically and I hate that, switching back to straight talk soon because of it.
@dorannmwin (36392)
• United States
24 Nov 10
That really stinks that this has happened to you. I've never been a victim of something like this in my own life unless you would include those random "services" for downloads that I have supposedly signed up for through my cellular phone number. Of course I've never signed up for any of those things, but there was one time that I had supposedly signed up for five of them in one month. Sorry, but I don't have the money to throw out the window like that.
@ersmommy1 (12587)
• United States
23 Nov 10
Wow! Never even heard of this. My hubby has things set up for autopay or online pay.I will mention this to him and make sure he pays closer attention. This should be illegal.
@dragon54u (31633)
• United States
22 Nov 10
I've heard of this and I look at my bills very, very carefully every month. That's one reason why I refuse to get electronic billing, I want a paper record if someone tries to defraud me!! I've never been crammed but I know people who have--one of my friends didn't know he'd been a victim till I mentioned it and we looked at his phone bill. He'd been paying for 2 months for something he didn't want and did not sign up for!
This should be illegal.
@missybear (11391)
• United States
22 Nov 10
That happened to us a couple times, luckily I always check our bills and make sure there are no extra charges on there.
We got it taken care of but still it's a pain in the butt trying to contact the phone people and getting it of your bill
@GardenGerty (169474)
• United States
21 Nov 10
This is a good warning. We had that happen once. All we ended up doing was having the charges reversed back to us. I used to be ignorant about stuff like this,but am not any more. Oh, and beware of magazine subscriptions of "receive these six for $49" I do not know if they still do it, but once they have your credit card it becomes $49 per month, which is not what you understand when on the phone.
@Hatley (163772)
• Garden Grove, California
22 Nov 10
hi 3snuggleBunnies oh ny yes all you have to do is answer one of their surveys and wham somehow they go my phone number and next thing we knew my son came to me,"MOm did you ask for this Oan services? No I said well they stuck a bill on our phone bill the first time I DID NOGT notice it but this time I thought wait a minute I did not agree to have streaming radio subscription so I thought maybe you did. mom we really cannot afford that" I told him about this survey and that was the only thing I had to do with them, I sure did not authorize them at all.Our phone company told us that was called cramming and they took the charge off our bill. my advice do not do any surveys for this company as they use your information to lay a charge on your phone. We also had another company try to make us take out a subscription fpr some site that charged to store emails for you.of all the silly things we did not need that and it was something like 30 dollars a month.this time I had answered a sweepstakes survey and this company again got our phone number. so from then on I was very careful what surveys I did.
@bunnybon7 (50970)
• Holiday, Florida
21 Nov 10
thank you for this post. ive copied to send my family this info. they arent on mylot. this really is good info to know. hard telling how many people are getting scammed by this. everything is so hard these days and everyone is getting and saving money every where they can. 
@cynthiann (18612)
• Jamaica
22 Nov 10
Boy, some people will stop at nothing to commit fraud against other people. Totally disgusting and I am so happy that you were smart enough to outwit them. Look how much money they must have made from other unsuspecting people? Many thanks for this tip. We have to be so careful no matter where we live. Out citizens out here have some credit card scams and debit card scams. We all just have to take precautions against theft. Blessings
