FCC Says Six More Companies Engaged in 'Slamming'
The FCC said six companies switched consumers' telecom service providers without their authorization, violating rules against "slamming." The Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau issued nine orders Tuesday granting consumer slamming complaints against America Net (here), CenturyLink (here), GPSPS (here, here…
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and here), Long Distance Consolidated Billing (here), TeleDias Communications (here and here) and TeleUno (here). None of the companies was fined, but in cases where consumers had not already paid unauthorized service fees, the unauthorized carriers were ordered to remove all charges incurred for service provided to complainants for the first 30 days after the service change. In those cases where consumers had already paid unauthorized service fees, the FCC ordered the unauthorized carriers to forward to the consumers' authorized carriers (which in at least two cases was also CenturyLink) an amount equal to 150 percent of all charges and copies of their bills; the authorized carriers were then ordered to credit or refund to consumers 50 percent of what they had paid the unauthorized carriers, among other actions. The bureau Friday issued similar orders finding four companies had engaged in slamming (see 1512180043).