Dear Editor,
I would like to warn my community about something that just happened to me and my Verizon land line: I got “slammed!” Slamming means a criminal company somehow gets access to your account and makes unauthorized charges. It is illegal. When I got this month’s Verizon phone bill, surprise, it was over $100.00 more than usual in additional long distance charges I did not authorize. My plan with Verizon is a flat rate that includes all the long distance calls I care to make within the continental United States. The company that decided to mess with the wrong Texas woman is GPSPS, Inc., President Clint Parry, 3355 Lenox Road #750, Atlanta, GA 30326, phone 888-723-0372 (just in case this happens to you). I was vexed enough to look up the contact info for and file formal complaints with Verizon, the Better Business Bureau, the Public Utility Commission of Texas, the Texas Attorney General’s Office of Consumer Protection, the Blanco County Sheriff’s Department, and the FBI. I figured if this criminal company just tried to do this to me, who else are they trying to scam? Hence, this letter to the Editor is my head’s up to you. Watch your phone bill and don’t let this happen to you! Fight back!
P.S. Proactive advice: call your local phone company and ask them to place a Primary Interexchange Freeze (aka “PIC Freeze”) on your account. This will prevent a change in your long distance service without a written request according to the Texas Public Utility Commission. ALSO ask them to put a “Slamming Block” on your account at no charge.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Oines
Blanco TX
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