Jun 08
12
You may be an AT&T customer and not even know it!
A cautionary tale for all my readers out there! About a month ago, I received a postcard at my current home address stating that my AT&T long distance plan would begin charging a $4.95 monthly fee starting in June. Besides the fact I refuse to pay monthly fees for long distance on principle, the problem with this postcard is that I have NO LONG DISTANCE SERVICE (through AT&T or anyone else) on my home phone line. I previously had a no monthly fee plan through SBC (which became AT&T), but canceled it after they pulled the same stunt but didn’t bother to send a post card to warn me in advance. So why did I get this postcard?
The first call was to the AT&T toll-free number on the postcard, which connected me to a rep in India would quickly confirmed that I did not have any AT&T long distance service on my current phone line. Unable to tell me why I received the postcard, she transferred me to the AT&T Texas local market office. The rep in Texas looked up the account and came to the same conclusion, but advised that I call the AT&T long distance office to see if they could give me any more insight into what was going on. So I took down the 800 number and called them.
This new 800 number takes me to another rep who asks for the same information as the first two reps and quickly comes to the same conclusion. Seeing no long distance, he says I need to be transferred back to Texas when I advise him that it was that same office that transferred me to him. Sounding confused, I ask that he look up the name and address rather than the phone number since something had to be there with that address to generate the postcard.
After looking it up by name and address, the source is found! Oddly enough I had AT&T long distance on my very first phone line upon moving to Texas, and although I had disconnected the line in 2002 and advised AT&T of such at the time, they were still showing me as an active customer with the old phone number. The rep went in and canceled the account and provided a confirmation number for the cancellation, and assured me I would not be receiving a bill from them for the account. Of course this was after having to sit through several pitches for additional services after explicitly stating I was not interested in changing or adding services.
Thankfully it seems to have worked out well, but I do wonder what would happen if the number was reissued to someone else and they started making long distance calls. Would I receive the bill? How many other people out there still have active AT&T accounts on phone numbers they disconnected long ago?
I guess the lesson here is to make sure you contact your long distance company to notify them you have disconnected the line, and to make sure to get a confirmation number for your records.