IBA - Internet Business Associates - ESBI - Enhanced Services Billing, Inc. added several unauthorized $39.95 charges to my telephone bills, over many months Carson City Nevada
Yesterday, I noticed a charge on my monthly [land line] phone bill for $39.95 plus state sales tax. This amounts to $42.35 a month, I have been paying to my phone company. And for what?
I will swear on a stack of bibles that I never have nor I never will authorize such an add-on to my bill. I work way too hard for my money and throwing it out the window, like this, just pisses me off to no end!
Upon contacting my phone company, the representative and I got on a conference call with ESBI. We were assured that I will receive a refund of 2 months but, to receive the remaining months' charges, I must write a letter to a company named by ESBI, "Internet Business Associates (IBA), 2533 N. Carson St., suite 5-1, Carson City, NV 89706".
I have no confidence in ESBI and so, I will be filing complaints with the my state dept of consumer protection, state attorney general's office, U. S. government** and my phone company until all the charges and associated state taxes have been removed from my bill. Further, I suggested to my phone company that they review their policies regarding "crammers".
Not all of us review our telephone bills. Most of us trust our phone companies as we, generally, have long term relationships with them.
For further information regarding IBA, ESBI, and its other "shell" companies, read,
For Release: August 6, 2001
Telephone "Crammers" Settle FTC Charges
Billing Aggregators Debited Phone Bills for Charges Consumers Didn't Authorize, http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2001/08/billing3.shtm
** U. S. Government = FBI, BBB, FTC, FCC, US Dept of Justice
Brian
Effort, Pennsylvania
U.S.A.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Chantillian
Chantilly,Virginia,
U.S.A.
What may have happened
#2Consumer Suggestion
Fri, February 13, 2009
This isn't really a "rebuttal" per-se, but I want to mention that before these charges starting showing up on the phone bill, Brian might have gotten - and forgotten - the same scammy phone call that I got earlier today.
The person says they're renewing our free yellow pages subscription. (I was like, "Yeah, ok" while nursing my first coffee of the day.) He has me verbally interact with a recording which confirms our address, phone number, etc. At the point in the recording where it asks if I want to renew the free subscription, the live guy talks over it explaining to me what it's asking and that I should reply verbally with a "yes". I asked to hear just the recording, not him. He replays the recording but talks over it again. So rather than just "yes", I record, "Yes, I want to renew my free subscription." (Yes, you're right, I should have just hung up.)
Was that "Yes" all that he needed - chopping off the rest? I don't know. The live guy drops out of the phone call.
The recording went on to say that they are Internet Business Associates in Carson City. Googling this info brought me to this RipOff report. I called ESBI and they say that without my phone number in their system, they have no way of coming up with IBA's number. ESBI's CSR supervisor, Jaimie, denies that ESBI has any directory of clients within which she could look up IBA's info. Meanwhile, 411 has no info about IBA in Carson City. I'm trying other ways to come up with a phone number. Meanwhile, I guess I need to wait until the next phone bill comes in to see if there's a strange $39.95 charge on it. :-(