As soon as I regained connectivity with the outside world (about two miles from the resort—and, believe me, never have three bars on my Blackberry been so welcome), I phoned my card company to find out why the charge had been declined. Informed that a pay phone provider was trying to charge my card $30.00, the credit card company flagged the attempt as potentially fraudulent. Something had triggered the alert system and they put a hold on my card to prevent further use of my identity or the card. (Yes, they released my card, so I was able to pay my $200 limo charge and make my flight—which, since it was delayed six hours anyway, would not have been too much of a stretch in any case.)
Now I was even more unnerved. Thirty bucks? Before I’d even connected to a call? Something did not seem right about this, as it did not seem right to my credit card company. Checking my bill online the next day, I now noticed the four attempted (one successful, one minute) phone calls. I had been charged more than $20.00 for each attempted call, although only one call lasted more than four seconds. Voice mail had picked up the other three calls (I hung up before leaving messages).
Yeah. You heard right. Twenty dollars! Each. “Where was she calling?” you might ask. Pakistan? Iraq? Antarctica? No, I was calling Chicago. I was calling from New York to Chicago. Yes. Twenty dollars for a non-call. And one 40 second call. Seriously. Obviously, I disputed the charges with my credit card company, and then proceded to call the pay phone provider.
“Yes, I see the calls right here,” said a cheerful customer service rep with a Texas drawl (the company is based in Texas). “Four calls; all less than a minute apparently. But they were all connected.”
“To a voice mail,” I interrupted, ignoring for the moment that she was acknowledging the fact that I had been charged $20 per fraction of a minute for a phone call.
“Well, you were connected. We charge a $15 connect fee and then the other five was for the time you were connected.” Which, I reminded her was less than a minute.
Article comments
1 - Tourist
I once used a blue tourist phone in Mexico to make 6 calls, totalling 15 minutes. The phone only worked with a credit card. I was billed $440. I disputed the charges and my credit card company backed me up. It was traced back to a New Jersey company (Jimmy Hoffa anyone?)