Telephone Consumers in Ireland are Vulnerable for Cramming (Unauthorized, Misleading, or Deceptive Charges Placed on Your Telephone Bill)

The consumer gets crammed when a dishonest company puts charges on their phone bill (landline or mobile phone) for services that were not wanted or authorized by the customer.  

Cramming has been around for more than a decade—ever since phone companies were allowed to make extra money by billing for other companies. Until recently, the phenomenon had been mostly limited. These days this scam is a growing problem for phone customers in Ireland. 

More alarmingly, a study in the United States of America found that only 1 in 20 cramming victims realize they’ve scammed. That’s because the crammers are clever. They know how to make their illegal fees easy to miss by consumers. They keep the amounts small and list them on the bill as something innocuous, such as monthly charge or service fee.

People don’t see it, and if they do see it, they don’t pay attention. It is estimated that in Ireland it is amounting millions of Euro every Month.

Recently I have found in my mobile phone bill that the company was known as SightMobile, and MobileNobo crams me over € 38.00 illegally. It is merely criminal practice, even the companies are cramming to the telephone users are not physically present in the country.  

Unfortunately, you cannot assume that every charge that is on your phone bill is a charge that should be there.

It is high time that Irish Government, An Garda Síochána, The Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg) and Irish telephone service providers can jointly launch a campaign against these schemes and make people aware of this scam.

The Irish Government and COMREG need to regulate immediately that:

The consumer must have the right to instruct their telephone service providers to block all third-party payments, and this simple step will eliminate cramming.

It should be mandatory for telephone companies to notify subscribers at the point of each sale (by text message) on each bill and facilitate to the consumer on their website to block third-party charges from their telephone bills.

Telephone service providers must have a responsibility to notify the law enforcement agencies about suspected Cramming.

As a vigilant consumer, please check your bill and telephone usage carefully:

It’s your money, and you need to watch out for erroneous charges on your bill and inform the service provider to get it removed.

If you crammed contact the COMREG, they are recording every complaint and investigating it up to your satisfaction.

In conclusion, CRAMMING is another by-product of the economic liberalization and deregulation of the telecom industry. The governments across the world have a responsibility to protect the consumer first to make a response to the local companies for verification of any third party payments or services. 

   

I am a victim of the cramming, and I am writing to make aware everyone about this scam. I love to see if my story can bring changes to the consumer’s rights campaign and for the regulation of the telecom sector worldwide.

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