Sen. Charles E. Schumer called on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to mandate that consumers cannot be charged third party fees by so-called “crammers” unless they give their explicit consent directly to their cell phone carriers; he also urged wireless carriers to voluntarily ban the practice.
Schumer’s call comes in the wake of numerous reports of so-called “cramming” scams where scammers send consumers confusing text messages offering phony services that result in unauthorized fees on monthly bills. While Verizon and AT&T just recently announced their plans to block third party charges on telephone landlines without customer pre-approval, carriers have not extended this change to wireless customers.
The senator urged carriers to vol- untarily agree to block third party cramming charges in the interim while he works to see the FCC puts in place mandatory restrictions.
“Cell phone cramming is merely scamming by another name-it steals money from cell phone users and the FCC and carriers must take prompt action to snuff it out,” said Schumer. “Cell phone bills nowadays can be dozens of pages long and if you don’t pay close attention, buried in your bill somewhere could be a $10 charge you never authorized or mistakenly agreed to by replying to an unsolicited text message. The simple truth is that no one should be able to put a charge on your cell phone bill unless you have given explicit, affirmative consent, and unfortunately it’s becoming more and more common that the charges appear fist and then consumers have to dispute them later. Both Verizon and AT&T have taken positive steps to end the practice on landlines, but we must ensure the same protocol for wireless customers.”
According to recent reports, over the past several years, New Yorkers and Americans across the country have been unknowingly charged up to $10 a month for text messages that contain unwanted offers or services. Companies send these text messages to wireless customers without approval, automatically charging their bills. Most of the time, the consumer has no idea that this otherwise innocuous text message will later show up on the bill.
When the charges do show up, they are often labeled as “service fee,” “other fees,” “voicemail,” “calling plan” or some other vague term for which the consumer is tricked into believing that they are required to pay.
One New York constituent recently received text messages with random information, like “Flamingos are pink because they eat shrimp,” and then a text message that stated to end these messages reply “stop”. The constituent didn’t reply out of fear that it would encourage more spam – but against his wishes, he got an itemization on his bill for $9.99 for “ringtone” – a service he didn’t ask for and didn’t want. Even if a consumer catches the hidden, unwanted charge, they must go through an onerous process to remove it.
Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia recently held multiple hearings on Capitol Hill to crack down on the practice. Most recently, he successfully pressured Verizon and AT&T change their third party billing policies to block cramming fees from appearing on landlines and plans to introduce legislation to make the practice illegal.
In a letter to CTIA, the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunications Industry, Schumer urged carriers to institute voluntary bans and to work with the FCC to put in place mandatory restrictions on third-party billing to protect consumers from unsolicited and unwanted fees on their cell phone bills.
Schumer specifically wants the FCC to require wireless carriers to get affirmative consent from consumers for any third-party charge before it winds up on a bill and called on the other major carriers to adopt a ban in the meantime to prevent customers from receiving these unwanted charges.
The senator argued that the cell phone wireless companies, which allow these crammers to operate, must take responsibility to prevent this practice from occurring because cramming is simply unfair to consumers who neither requested nor approved such a charge.
