- Report: #130551
Complaint Review: MCI - Iowa City Iowa
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Author Confirmed
Why?
MCI
MCI 1 800-collect Iowa City, 52244 Iowa, U.S.A.
Phone:
800-444-3333
Web:
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MCI advertise Ripoff .10 min for collect calls charged $4.00 surcharge plus 47.99 for 34 min call Iowa City Iowa
my son called collect from the air force base (ft. gordon, ga.)i was charged 47.99 for a 34 min phone call. they advertise .10 min for their collect service. when i called them to question this they informed me that this is a misunderstanding. they charge depending on the mileage distant and add a $4.00 surcharge. i told them i had just read on one of their websites that stated a .10 min charge and nothing about a surcharge. they told me there's no website that states this. rest assured i will never accept another collect call using this service.
Debbria
Clearfield, Kentucky
U.S.A.
Debbria
Clearfield, Kentucky
U.S.A.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Ex-mci
New York,New York,
U.S.A.
I am a former MCI employee. I don't know why I should defend them, but I guess I hated the inbred customers as much as the company, so it's all good.
#2UPDATE EX-employee responds
Mon, February 21, 2005
If you were being charged by the mile for a collect call, your son wasn't calling from an "air force bace" - he was calling from a correctional facility, as these are the only calls charged by the mile. Also, these types of calls are blocked by default and can only be unblocked by a DOCS (department of correctional services) representative, assuming this particular facility is one that is under contract with MCI. If not, you have to call the company this facility is under contract with to unblock the calls to your phone number. Let's pretend for a moment that you had that part of your story wrong and it's just a simple issue of rate misunderstanding. You have to realize that the rates advertised on TV and on the web are for using a specific phone number (whether dialing out or receiving collect calls), and are sometimes limited time offers (or have other restrictions). One's best bet is to always ask the operator for the rate that will be paid for the call. If at that point you are told one thing and billed another, then you have a valid complaint. Otherwise, just another case of a customer who misunderstood their service and is mad because they didn't perform due dilligence to ensure they knew what they were getting. To add further doubt to your story, you don't provide the supposed website address with this magical 10c per minute rate. I certainly hope you provided this to the customer service rep to prove your point and didn't just expect to believe some figure you pulled out of thin air (would rather use the nether region expression, but will keep this clean).
