Urgent Advice: Check Your Phone Bill!
January 25th, 2010
Paying bills is never a particularly enjoyable process, but it’s even worse when you believe that some scumbag company has latched on to your personal information and started charging you for a service you know with absolute certainty you never requested.
This happened to me yesterday, and it’s not the first time: My Verizon bill included a $20 charge “billed on behalf of Headwind Media” ostensibly for “Cmi xclusivemo.” You can see the charge from Headwind Media in the scan above.
It’s probably no coincidence that a Google search for “cmi xclusivemo” returns as its first result this Ripoff Report page.
Here’s another one worth viewing; search for “Headwind” on that page and look at the comments.
Do a search for “Headwind Media” on Google and look at all the complaints that turn up.
My guess is that Headwind Media is doing some sort of data mining to add customers to their books: When I called to have them remove the charge from my phone bill (which, to their dubious credit, the Headwind Media representative said they would), I was told that the account was activated using an email address I haven’t used in years (and barely used when I did).
Plus, the woman on the phone who was looking into the account referenced the name of my wife, who never had access to that email address to begin with.
About five seconds of Googling will demonstrate how the Internet is lousy with complaints about this sort of practice.
It needs to stop.
Immediately.
Oh, by the way: If someone from Headwind Media should actually get back in touch with me, I will be more than happy to print their response unedited. I sent emails to several addresses I found online (two of them returned delivery errors as I write this) saying, among other things, that I “would appreciate your perspective on how my phone bill could get charged by your company using information that is both erroneous and outdated.” One response from this address was simply: “What can we do for you?” Ummmmm … for starters, show that you actually read my email?
Takeaway for everyone: Take a very close look at your phone bill before you pay it.
JANUARY 26 UPDATE: Everyone in the world of customer service should be half as helpful and as nice as the Lisa from Verizon I just spoke with. A few takeaways:
(1) You can call your phone company and put an automatic block on miscellaneous charges like these, though it’s not 100 percent foolproof (Lisa said she was obligated to say that, but she also added that for all intents and purposes it really is).
(2) Lisa told me that I was the fourth person today calling her about Headwind Media. Multiply Lisa by however many customer service representatives Verizon has, and the magnitude of whatever they’re up to becomes clear.
(3) Lisa told me that in addition to Headwind Media, the two other companies people complain most about for similar practices are OAN and ESBI. Search for either of those along with “telephone” and “bill” and you’ll see all the complaints out there.
Another takeaway for everyone: Call your phone company immediately and block the charges now — before they get added to your phone bill without your knowledge.
January 25th, 2010 at 10:46 am
I have Verizon FIOS for cable,internet and phone. I have absolutely no complaints about the services, but have a LOT of complaints regarding billing. I went to paperless billing missed ONE payment and all services were cut off less than 2 weeks after 1 payment was missed. As I explained in my email, its not like I am some dead beat customer and have very good credit. I’m not the only one complaining. I sent a an email off and received an automated call from a VP (don’t remember what dept) with her email address telling me if I had complaints email her. I emailed her and have received 2 phone calls already. One from a PR person and another from the collections office. BTW…they added 11.00 for service termination.
March 2nd, 2010 at 4:29 pm
Headwind Media is at it again..but this time with AT&T.
I made a report with my local AT&T but that was not enough for me. I wanted to know that a FRAUD report was made with AT&T and that they were investigating it.
Do you know how difficult it is to find the phone numbers for AT&T Corporate offices? Well it took a while. I found out about the building that houses AT&T Corp in Dallas, TX. Then I looked in the Yellow pages online for an AT&T number and put the 2 together! Voila! The executive offices answered! Alas..they still put me through to a number in Atlanta, my regional office.
They are going to send the info to Consumer Appeals and they will investigate the charge on my phone bill.
I am a former police officer. I figured this was the first month that Headwind Media tried scamming AT&T customers. So why not nip it in the bud before it goes further and many customer’s credit is ruined by this fraud/scam?!!
They told me they would get back to me in 48 hours with some info on the investigation. I also made them aware that I called my local ABC, CBS, and NBC TV stations about doing a report on the scam. Maybe that will get them moving it along!?
So it pays to research and investigate and find the proper people to handle a fraud of this nature. This could go globally, like it did with Verizon!
Hope this helps anyone out there who finds this fraud on their AT&T phone bill.
March 2nd, 2010 at 8:18 pm
Thanks for sharing your story, Barbara — good luck in your efforts!!!