timmy1376 said:
So I looked at the ole phone bill today, and it was about $15 more than normal, so I went to see why. Saw at the bottom I was charged $14.95 by OAN Services, Inc. The line says "ODYSSEY EMAIL MONTHLY SERVICE CHARGE". It was billed on a Thursday. I am not sure what the heck is going on, but we in no way authorized this. I tried to call SBC but they are not open, so hopefully we can get this figured out Monday. Has anyone else seen anything strange like this on their bills??
need i say more??????????
Seebach Exhibit 7
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Spurious collect call charges - a new scam? "OANWEB.COM"
So, I got a call billed to my account "on behalf of Nationwide Connections, Inc.". Listing the phone number 1-800-944-9646, and the web page
www.oanweb.com. They claim that we got a 4-minute collect call, on November 7th, at 11:08 AM. We didn't; our caller ID log shows no calls at all on November 7th, not even "OUT OF AREA".
OANWEB ripoffs are apparently not unheard of.
What's interesting is the apparent difficulty of contesting charges. Qwest says they are forwarding this bill "as a service to OAN services inc", but OAN services, who are (from their page) obviously not any kind of long distance company, but rather, a small-time financial scam organization of some sort, are probably just ripping people off by bits and pieces here and there.
I'll see whether I can make any progress on this.
Posted by seebs on December 11, 2004 05:40 AM |
It's OAN services at oanservices.com.
They are the front end for all sorts of slammers.
Hand 'em over the the FCC and the AG.
seebs_lawyer | December 11, 2004 09:56 AM
Maybe the next time Qwest CEO Dick Notebaert comes in to talk to the newspaper, I should ask him? It worked the last time Qwest took months to fail to solve a service problem.
--seebs' mom
linsee | December 13, 2004 10:38 AM
Got a bill from OANWEB / Nationwide Connections today - same deal: 4 minute bogus collect call. I will forward to the state AG and others.
Brent Filler | December 13, 2004 01:36 PM
I called them, at 800-944-9646, and they said they'd dispute the charge and reverse it. I think I have the conversation taped, although, when I went downstairs, the tape recorder was off again. Dunno what happened.
Anyway, they said that OANWEB.COM really is them, although I think the woman I spoke to was not paying close attention. I told her I was home and would have noticed the phone ringing, and that our caller ID log showed no calls at all on November 7th, but she said "since you say there was no one home to accept the call, we will mark that you dispute the charge, and a reversed charge should show up on your phone bill within one or two months".
Needless to say, I'm not entirely optimistic.
seebs | December 13, 2004 06:04 PM
I just received a charge from OAN Services for $5.26, for a collect call from Pierce, Idaho!
Looks like a scam and a fraud. Why aren't these people in jail?
Copies to the Washington PUC and etc.
Byron Swanson | December 15, 2004 08:33 PM
Got my Qwest bill today replete with charges of $4.75 from OANWEB NATIONWIDE CONNECTIONS (800-944-9646) for an alleged collect call from Portland to Yakima. The phone call was allegedly made from 503-251-9705. No such collect call was ever accepted and no such collect call was ever even received. I have worked in the legal profession for 30 years and I will not hesitate to bring this matter to the attention of the local prosecuting attorney and the WA. State Attorney General.
Larry Ausink | December 15, 2004 08:54 PM
Interesting to note that many people are seeing this!
I am told that Qwest is probably legally obliged to pass the charges on... The thing to do is make FCC complaints until the FCC yanks the licensing that gives these people the power to send on "real" phone bills.
The FCC has a complaint form you can fill out online. I did. If enough other people do, the FCC may start looking more closely at OAN, OANWEB, OANSERVICES, OAN Services, or whatever they want to call themselves, or perhaps more specifically at Nationwide Connections, who appear to be the underlying agency.
My understanding is that OAN is a big front-end firm that does billing for a lot of places, some of which may be, through sheer coincidence, legitimate.
seebs | December 16, 2004 06:27 AM
Same thing happen yesterday got my SBC bill with a collect call from California to Houston I called OAN today and they said they would refund the charge on my bill. I hope they do!
Barry W | December 16, 2004 10:45 PM
My elderly dad just called me with the same complaint. I found this site telling me it was a scam. Thanks everyone and I follow the above advise to hopefully nail these bastards!
Marc K | December 17, 2004 12:53 PM
I just recieved my bill today and can't call to dispute until monday. Found this site while trying to figure out what the charge was because we had never heard of them. Thanks for the great advise above and I'll be contacting my JAG office too.
Dave W | December 19, 2004 02:59 AM
Update: I received a response to my complaint to the FCC. The FCC says that the correct agency to complain to is the FTC. You can go to
www.ftc.gov if you would like to complain.
This form of fraud is known as "cramming".
Brent Filler | December 20, 2004 05:17 PM
Nice to see i'm not the only one who got screwed. This OAN / Nationwide Connections thing seems common. I got a "collect" call from Spokane, WA supposedly on 11/5/04 for $6.25. Qwest of course will do nothing. i've already complained with the FTC and the BBB will do nothing without contact info (address, etc.) Hope these idiots get what's coming to 'em. I'll be first in line with the wrench
Steve | December 25, 2004 01:27 AM
Got scammed too I'm going to the
www.ftc.gov to get these people screwed. By the way the Qwest rep I spoke with said they never heard of a scam with this company--ha!
Jim | December 27, 2004 01:29 PM
Apparently, OAN has gotten in trouble for this before. The earliest mention of them I found was as a billing company for some 900# and modem-hijacking scammers:
http://www.thedailystar.com/news/stories/2001/06/11/phonescam.html
That story didn't blame OAN for the problem, but eventually some folks realized that OAN does business with very bad customers. In 2001, the California PUC sued some phone scammers, later adding OAN and some other billing companies to the suit:
http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/proceedings/I9808004.htm
The courts eventually vacated OAN from the case. Around the same time, OAN went bankrupt, and a rival company bought them out:
http://sanantonio.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/stories/2001/05/28/daily18.html
However, the new owners apparently aren't any better. In fact, Verizon recently suspended billing for USA Voicemail, one of OAN's sibling companies:
http://www.nbc10.com/consumeralert/3888234/detail.html
This company
