My friend has ALS also known as Lou Gehrigs disease. HE is in Southern California. I am in Georgia. I have been talking to him for about a month now. He wanted me to help him get in touch with the Als foundation. He said that the cell phone he was talking on was in his girlfriends name, and that she was threatening to turn it off. Well, now it is off and the ALS foundation can't even get in touch with him. He doesn't have use of his arms and hands, but has figured out how to dial a number after they have called him.

Does anyone know of a way to help him get a cell phone? I am unemployed right now, so I don't have any extra funds. His family lives on the East Coast and him on the West Coast. It is really important for him to talk to family. And in case of an emergency.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
TLW Georigia

Phone companies are the Devil! Pure evil, see for yourself!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=y-7XwboOx98

I came across this site during research on ring tone providing websites. I agree with everyones complaint in the difficulty in canceling these charges brought to you. I do not agree with letting your children use your cellular phone. Children are often irresponsible, as were we all at one point. We often initiate these charges on the phone through our own acknowledgment or the acknowledgment of a "responsible party that uses the line. Cell phone is billed through the primary legal holder of the line, therefore anyone who uses the line is acting on behalf of the primary account holder. These cell phone service providers have their legal backs covered, prior to providing or billing these types of services.

Second note: it should be easy to cancel any type of digital agreement for billing of these types of third party services. The cellular service provider should be able to provide you with this type of information. If No one is willing to help. Contact you local state attorney general, and follow the appropriate steps towards a resolution. Sometimes the attorney general's office can get your money back for you.

I recently got a text message saying this...

CSW subscription renewed @$9.99/mo
Get ur contents
Downlad at

www.ringtonetimes.com
4help:customercare [at] funmobile [dot] com18772251198
cxl stop DH

Listen, Please don't respond to these text messages. It is a fruad, and you will end up being charged more. The text # is 71769
I had never even heard of this company, much less subscribed to it. When I went to the website, it said I had Joke of the day credits. Something needs to be done. I don't have a lot of money, and it sucked 9.99 out of my account. I only have $11.29 left. Someone help.

BOYCOTT SPRINT. These mother f.ckers are trying to charge me 100 dollars for a picture mail that I never sent. Two months ago, I had picture mail blocked from my phone and a couple of weeks ago, I tested it to see if it was really blocked. I took a picture of my daughter and went through the motions of sending it to my wife ( another unfortunate Sprint customer). When I tried to send it, a message popped up saying that this service is blocked on my phone per subscriber's request. So I thought that everything was fine but when I received my bill, the sons of biches charged me $98.25 extra bucks for it. So I called the customer service line and waited on hold for about 40 minutes until I finally got a hold of some kid. I told him what had happened and she said that I'm being charged because I "attempted" to send the picture mail and because I don't have it included on my plan, they charge 3 cents per KB and one normal pic is about 7500 KBS. So I asked to speak to a manager, so she puts me on hold for about 10 more minutes when *mysteriously* my call got disconnected. This is the biggest crock of sh!t I've ever dealt with. How the f.ck are they gonna remove the service and charge me for testing it to see if they did their job right when the damn pic didn't even go through. Does anyone else have any Sprint horror stories?

EVEN THE COMPLAINT PAGE IS A RIP-OFF TO GET MORE CELL #
I never contacted this company, just received charges. A true rip-off! Can anyone just bill people and make money this way?

Care [at] ringtonetimes [dot] com - Unauthorized charges!

After seeing this $!&*# on my bill for 2 months straight, I started checking out the VerizonWireless.com site. I was able to find the option to add/change features on my plan. One of the options is "Block Premium SMS". This will not only block new messages, it will stop any recurring charges. Below is the description from their site. Hope someone finds this helpful

Premium SMS (PSMS) Blocking prohibits adding premium fee based messaging programs to the selected mobile number while allowing all other messaging services (including text and MMS) to work as usual. PSMS Blocking will terminate all current Premium SMS programs at the time the blocking feature is activated. No credits or pro-rating will be applied to the Premium SMS fees already incurred. All messaging services will continue to be billed per your Calling Plan and Messaging Bundle or at the standard messaging rate as applicable.

If anyone was charged on their cell phone bill for ringtones or other mobile content that you never ordered, you might want to get in touch with some class action attorneys. These guys have a site devoted to unauthorized cell phone charges and might be able to help you:

http://www.classactionconnect.com/?q=node/680

They also have a blog if you want to share your cell phone bill complaints with others:

http://www.classactionconnect.com/cell_phone_issues

(revised, please delete previous post to remove PB exec's name)

I am beyond angry after being scammed by Photobucket's new signup form.

I recently opened a Photobucket account. I had no idea that I had to watch my back so carefully with Photobucket, because they have always seemed to be a reputable, aboveboard company. I was wrong, and I now consider them criminally deceptive. I have never felt so abused by an online company, and I am shocked and angry.

In a yellow box, implying that it was REQUIRED information, Photobucket asked for my cell phone number. I'm ill and on medication, and I was not thinking clearly enough to differentiate between PHONE number and CELL phone number, or question a yellow box on a form. I gave Photobucket my number, assured by their deceptive "we won't call you!"

Immediately I got a spam text message from RingAZA, informing me that I was subscribed to get ringtones for $9.99. I closed my phone, but the message remained until I replied STOP.

I then got a message saying I was "unsub" from RingAZA.

I don't believe it. I believe I will be fighting a FRAUDULENT charge on my phone bill, courtesy of Photobucket's criminal scam partners, Ringtone Channel, or whoever they are. I blame this on Photobucket.

It has been extremely difficult to track down anyone at Photobucket who's willing to say anything. I went to their help forums and got a lot of doubletalk from low-level troubleshooters who simply gave me useless 800 numbers for the scamming company, where I spoke to a rude, ditzy phone worker who informed me "WE DON'T HAVE TO HELP YOU." I filed complaints online, and got form letters saying "We are sorry you do not like our associates' offers" and giving me the same useless 800 numbers from the scam companies. Photobucket's first tier offers nothing but resistance and false "help."

I dug around in their website and got some names, and got their Palo Alto office's number from Directory Assistance. I reached what appears to be their liason with Photobucket Pro users. She called back and has courteously assured me that a higher-up will call me tomorrow. She expressed total shock and dismay that this is going on, but you know... THIS IS NOT HAPPENING BY ITSELF. I want to see accountability.

Photobucket, at some high level, decided to partner with these scammers who attach fraudulent charges to users' phone bills simply for being stupid enough to enter a number in the yellow form box. The form is one of the most deceptive things I have ever seen on the Internet, and it is absolutely disgusting that it's being used by a "reputable" company.

I'm sick (stage IV cancer) but I'm VERY angry, and I am strong and resourceful enough to fight this. $9.99 is merely an annoyance to me, but I worry about nicer people, the elderly, for example, many of whom may be on very limited budgets. I worry about people who don't know how to pursue such things. Students, housewives, people whose first language is not English. Photobucket and its criminal partners must be making a killing by stealing from such people, who never intend to pay $9.99 for a ringtone, but may not have the ability to fight it when it appears on their phone bill.

Every time I think about this, I get angrier. I want Photobucket to PAY. I want to see this practice completely exposed.

I want every person who works at Photobucket to THINK about how these fraudulent $9.99 phone bill charges may hurt some little old lady who needs that money for food or medicine, and who can't begin to fight these creeps. They make it extremely difficult to track down anyone who knows anything about this, and the low-level techs I reached on the forums were obviously under orders to keep a lid on customer outrage.

Photobucket must be stopped. At this point, I want to see them fined heavily and publicly exposed for this practice.

I have time and energy and determination to expose and FIGHT Photobucket's signup scam. Where do I go to form an army?

We have been charged an ongoing $9.99 plus taxes by SPRINT for a 3rd party charge from Bid4Priz that is owned by New Motion, Inc. They, Bid4Priz and New Motion, apparently make deceptive web site ads and test messages ads to get cell phone numbers to make fraudlent charges to one's cell phone. SPRINT allows this scam to take place even though they have been told about it for months. We never ordered anything from Bid4Priz nor did we receive anything from them. Bid4Priz and SPRINT don't care if you are getting ripped off, they just want your money.

I also recieved my bill from Verizonwireless....had 2 charges for premium text messages for 9.99 each. I called, and I have to pay for them. I texted stop to both, and both gave me a number to call, so here it is if anyone wants it.

63232 ringtone thingy: dada.net: http://us.dada.net 1-888-214-0381

66047 findyouradmirer.horscopes 1-800-235-7105

my home phone has blocks on it not to allow these kind of charges, they should allow these kind of blocks on cell phones.

I'm going back to cricket. I had them for 5 yrs, my bill was the same every month, unlimited calls and text..nothing to count..I could even check my yahoo or hotmail emal on my phone. I also got 500 long distance minutes a month which never got used, I dont' call out of state. All for 67 a month, including the taxes. now my verizon is over 200 a month and my plan is only 79.99. I tried verizon and do not like it, so going back to cricket and will happily pay the cancellation fee for verizon, it will be well worth it.

Also getting 9.99 charges on virgin mobile, anyone know how to get rid of these charges

I have a prepay verizon wireless account and in the past 4 days I have been charged $10.08 twice, everytime I add $ they charge. I never signed up for them. Does anyone know contact information for these people? I called verizon and they told me it was coming from "Ring my Tones" # 66047 Mobile Messenger. If anyone can help it would be appreciated. Thank you

Here is the info for CSW/ringtonetimes. You can call and enter your cell number and be deleted from there list. Office hours MF 8-5 Eastern time. Below is link to website. What a scam operation.

http://www.ringtonetimes.com/contactus.do

For Customers:
If you require any assistance, please contact:
Email: care [at] ringtonetimes [dot] com
Hotline: 1877 225 1198

For Businesses Partners:
If you are our current partner, or looking for partnership with Ringtone Times, please contact:
E-mail: biz [at] ringtonetimes [dot] com

For Public Relations:
If you have public enquires, please contact:
E-mail: pr [at] ringtonetimes [dot] com

I had a problem with the bill for my new iPhone and like many I took to the internet for a solution. Fortunately, for me and for whoever finds this post, there seems to be a solution. I ran the bill at www.myvalidas.com and they got everything straightened out. Unfortunately, I was charged correctly, but had gone over my minutes without knowing. The ridiculous part was that I did not get my first bill until after the second billing cycle so there was NO warning.

See if you can find help at www.myvalidas.com.

Last month's bill from Sprint charged us over $45 for internet use which we had requested to NOT have on our plan. We called them immediately and they said that it was charged in error and the amount would be credited to our account. We just received this month's bill and the amount had NOT been credited, plus we had been charged an extra almost $12.00 for this month. We called Sprint again and they said that their "review" people had looked at the charge and said that it was valid, and that we were liable. Sprint customer service also said that we had used our phone for the internet a number of times, quoting times like midnight, 2 am and 4 am of the same night, among others. We have a family plan, and none of us have used our phones for internet use, yet they have these times and dates. Are we victims of cell phone hacking?

What really angered us was that the customer service people were particularly unhelpful, insisting that there was nothing they could do. We just have to pay up. They wouldn't even listen to what we had to say, just talked over us as if we weren't speaking at all. We eventually managed to get the Sprint person to allow us to talk to her supervisor who said much the same thing as she had, but asked whether we wanted them to initiate a fraud investigation. Of course we said yes. We are hoping that they actually do that and don't just do nothing and then come back to us saying that fraud had been ruled out.

We still have a year on our plan - and, yes, we have marked the end date of our contract on our calendars. We don't have $200 per line to fork out. This is one company we will gladly see the last of. It cannot come soon enough.

I am a t-mobile customer, i was surprise of the charge on my bill by some scam cell world wide services. be a ware of such services.

I'm almost 50 and disabled. I bought my wife a used cellphone from a company on e-bay to replace hers that was going bad. It came with a lot of personal information on it so I deleted it all. We heard these wild ringtones and after deleting them, my wife said she would like to have the theme song to "Saving Grace" currently on TV. I found a listing to download it free and by the time I was done, I was getting text messages that I was signed up for "COMBO CLUB" at $19.99 a month. This is through a company called RINGTONETIMES who is owned by CSW (Cellular Services Worldwide). I immediately notified Verizon of my problem and they said I should text the sender and make sure to insert the word STOP in the message. Boy did I!
I got a text message back saying the subscription was cancelled but I have not received my funds back in my prepay account. I spoke with Verizon again and they said they "hope" the company will return the money but they can't guarantee anything. I do not understand how this could happen in the first place. It is theft and I believe Verizon is responsible for allowing a 3rd party to take my funds as they have. The last message from this company is that they have no record of me having a subscription. How often does this happen to young people? This is a major scam that I bet reaches into millions of dollars for consumers. If it's not resolved, the next step is my debut on you tube!

Cell phone companies rip off customers any way they can. Competition must be so fierce that they only way to stay afloat is by making offers on deals that are below what they can afford and then inserting hidden charges or charging higher amounts to make up for it and hoping the customer doens't notice. I recently bought 2 phones with special promotions from ATT. In both cases when I looked at my receipt they had charged me more than what they said the price would be. And there were all these other fees that no one knew exactly what they were or why I had to pay them, but nonetheless the were there and I had to pay them.

Cingular has charged me for Credits/Adjustments/Other Charges 203.10

And I pay my BILL on time. DONT GET CINGULAR... THEY WILL RIP U OFF LIKE A DOG.

Thanks for sharing your story. Sprint PCS agreed to change its practice of charging for advertising text messages. Go to telecommunications on this web site and click on UCAN Sprint Settlement on the right side. It is called cramming when there are unauthorized charges on your bill and cramming is illegal.

Thank you.
SAM

CELL PHONE CARRIERS RIP OFF CLIENTS IN EVERY FIELD

Just got my billing. On it is a charge to both my wife's and my cell bill for text message sent from Cingular advertising text messaging is now available to our phones....and they charges us $.15 each for the message. If they mass messaged to all their customers...and charged...what an easy way to raise $$$... The upshot is we don't use text messaging..never have.