Comments on: ESBI a/k/a Enhanced Services Billing, Inc. | BSG Billing Services Group | Telephone Bill Complaints | Unauthorized Residential Phone Charges?

By: Richard

Richard — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 02:31:31 +0000

I just received my bill from AT&T. Which show that I have a charge for 12.95 from ESBI for VOICEMAIL SLTNS, LLC-VMAIL MNTHLY FEE for 12.95. I called the toll free number 1-866-576-1877 to have the charge reversed. They were able to reverse the charges and cancel the service. However, they said I will see the refund in my phone account in two to three billing cycles. This I have yet to see. This is the second time I had to go through the hassle to call and have the charges reversed and cancelled. I asked them to have the service blocked from happing again. They said it was not possible. I contact ESBI to see if they can block the service and they said they could not. So basically it means anybody can use my phone number as a credit card to make purchases and have it bill to my phone service. From my prospective it is a rip off. There needs to be some kind of safeguard to keep unauthorized charge from happening. I do have one service I do subscribe under EBSI which is fine. But it should only be I (Subscriber) that does the authorizing. Not some stranger picking a number out of a phone book just to get something. Oh and a warning to all. If you tell them you know the person that used your phone number; the problem becomes yours to collect your money from them. In other words you won’t get your refund. It becomes your problem. Laws need to be in place. This does not stimulate the economy, it destroys it for hard working people.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 19:29:16 +0000

Well, I just got my verizon bill today and was charged over $15 for ESBI for voicemail. The first post here was Sept 2008 so it seems not much has changed in 18 months. Verizon tells me to be carteful using 800 and 900 numbers and promises a block that they aren’t sure will work. Never did they admit that they may have a hand in this fiasco.

By: Deb Sours

Deb Sours — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 00:56:31 +0000

My elderly Mom has these ESBI charges on her phone. Last fall I finally got through to someone at Verizon who put a “block” on any other charges. Mom still gets a charge on her bill which she deducts each month and refuses to pay. Again today, I called Verizon, was referred to ESBI, who told me they refunded the charges and haven’t put any others on since last fall “it must be some other company..others bill through ESBI”. Well, on the bill, it says ESBI! So Monday, I will be contacting the attorney general’s office on my Mom’s behalf…she and I are sick and tired of all the run arounds. I think it is ridiculous that this even got started..how, we do not know. It is not for a service Mom requested, like ESBI told us way back then. I have threatened, pleaded, been nice, to no avail. This company NEEDS to be put under…there is no excuse for this. I have better things to do with my time than fight their charges…like, my job!

By: Property Accountant

Property Accountant — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 20:08:28 +0000

I noticed that everyone is complaining about AT&T, well Verizon has it two. Two of our business Verizon accounts have been billed for this service by three different company names. ESBI, Precision Webhost,& BIZ Values online. I called up ESBI, they told me that a Mia authorized the service, no one by that name, called up another vendor said it was my co-worker who signed up, co-worker says that an automated system came on asking questions, when the rep came on and explained the service she immidiately told them no, yet they signed up our account. They were quick to cancel barely made a fuss, I realized they did that because if you think about it, for the 1 person who catches this scam there are 10 who won’t and that’s where the money is.

By: Grandma

Grandma — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 23:02:26 +0000

We’ve been crammed by ESBI for 3 mos now. Talking to AT&T does nothing; last month they said they would block third party billing, but it hasn’t happened yet.

So–today I submitted a complaint to the NC Atty General’s Consumer Division about these thieves. I also informed them that ESBI was “collecting” NC tax for this non-existent service.

Anyone who gets this kind of billing, go to your state’s site and contact your AG and if ESBI is trying to collect state taxes as well, inform them of that.

My son’s reaction to this cramming was–”everybody is getting paid” and I believe it.

He calls it the “fleecing of America.”

By: Tom

Tom — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 03:45:16 +0000

$14.95 800VMAILBOX,INC-VOICEMAIL and ESBI Scam. Second month after calling and being told this charge would be dropped. Call the FCC and put these people out of business.

By: Ronnie

Ronnie — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 23:07:53 +0000

I just discovered this same $14.95 charge added to a company phone bill here at work. I’m quite surprised to learn how many people have had this same scam pulled on them over the years and yet AT&T continues to allow this! WTF?? I’ve filed complaints with the BBB and FCC, but don’t really expect anyone to actually get off their duff and do anything. I called “Key Club Save LLC” and spoke with “Phillip,” who told me he would credit our bill for SIX months worth of this fee – which tipped me off because this particular telephone bill is only FOUR months old. Then I called “Enhanced Services Billing Inc” and spoke with “Sam,” who tried to explain their billing processes to me – but since he didn’t make any sense whatsoever, I asked to speak to his supervisor. Sam hung up on me! No surprise there. Unfortunately, where we are located, AT&T is pretty much our only land-line provider, so we’re stuck. But my AT&T representatives have not heard the last of this. Grrr.

By: Marilyn J. Berdych

Marilyn J. Berdych — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 22:55:34 +0000

I was billed for 8 months by Enhanced Billing Services for a 3rd party company called Keyvoice that claimed I contracted by email to establish a voicemail account. Keyvoice rep gave me an email account that I did not set up, which they claimed was how their charges ended up on my phone bill. This is a scam. They must pay people to use public records to set up dummy email accounts and use an email sent from the bogus email account to justify the billing through Enhanced Services Billing Inc. which in turn adds the charges to the local phone company bill.

By: Stephen Toles

Stephen Toles — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 03:46:13 +0000

I too was scammed by these jerks!! I’ve had my at&t bill set up as an automatic monthly with-draw from my checking account and never paid attention to my bill until now. WOW, was I surprised to see charges from $16.07 to $34.14 per month for the last 10 months. I had both my phone & internet through at&t. I never used my land line so I wanted to cancel the land line but keep my internet, that’s when I noticed these charges. They told me the same song & dance that everyone else is stating “some woman name XXXXX signed up through a email coupon and provided my phone number for billing. They assured me this is a problem that rarely happens & they would credit me for the 10 months of billing which would take up to 3 months. They did offer to transfer me to one of their in-house fraud consultants so this will not happen to me in the future..I declined & advised they a V!%*(%& nuts, will you also charge me for that too! That’s no different than giving a known car thief, my car keys. How is it that a third party is allow to charge for their services on my at&t phone bill. Why don’t they have their billing which is sent from them directly? Whats next, the electric company might start charging me for lawn services. Enhanced services billing ,inc is a Scam.

By: bob

bob — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 15:13:48 +0000

I just wanted to make everyone aware of this company if they have AT&T landline service. This company charged my phone bill $21.45 a month to apparently receive faxes on my phone line. Did I mention it wasn’t even set-up in my wife or my name. It was set-up in a name of a roommate of mine from 6 years ago and three addresses ago. Of course AT&T claims it is not there problem and you have to deal with Enhanced Billing Services. I have now been charged for two months but they claim it has been stopped and I will get a credit in the next 1 or 2 billing cycles. Obviously, I am hesitant to believe them. When I asked them why they would allow someone who wasn’t even on the phone bill to sign up the service they gave an evasive answer. So I have learned two things, always check your phone bill closely and if you don’t like someone sign them up for Enhanced Billing Services.

By: Cai

Cai — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 06:11:11 +0000

Last month, I got credit for unauthorized charges from OAN Services thru AT&T. I told AT&T that OAN is a scam and AT&T suggested, and I agreed, to have future third party billing directly to me. Today, got my AT&T statement and lo and behold, another unauthorized charges but from diiferent name, this time it’s Enhanced Services Billing Inc. I called ESBI right away to cancel and will be credited $16.15. I can’t wait for next month to see what other third company name will show up on my bill.

By: Rick Andy

Rick Andy — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 17:08:16 +0000

My wife normally pays the bills but I recently looked at my AT&T bill and noticed ESBI charges, called AT&T and ESBI and was told they could only credit my account the previous three months. I then contacted my state-attorney’s office and office of consumer protection via email who advised me they were persuing these criminals. My most recent bill shows a credit from ESBI of $190.00

By: Rick

Rick — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:18:55 +0000

I was first billed in March of 2008 for an email account. I found they had billed me on the previous month as well. I had to contact the 3rd party company to cancel and request a refund that would take several billing cycles to resolve. They told me that I was charged because I responded to a marketing add in my email. The add had nothing to do with the phone company and did not say anything about signing up for anything. It was automatic just by opening the add. I contacted my phone company and requested a block to prevent anyone from submitting a 3rd party bill. I just received a second set of charges 2 years later in February of 2010. I had to do everything all over again. This time I googled the 3rd party company and found a class action lawsuit.

By: Llewop Haisoj

Llewop Haisoj — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 23:53:54 +0000

My parents recieved a bill and had a ridiculous charge on it for $14.95. He called and they had the charge put on my name for downloading music. I of course got yelled at n stuff about 3rd party companies, but thn went online to investigate and found other people struck with the same problem. It look like so far if ur married itll b charged on ur wife and if you have a son thn itll b charged on him.

By: Michele Parga Crawford

Michele Parga Crawford — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 23:15:27 +0000

I have been billed by ESBI for 15.62 over a 28 month period of time. I never signed up for the service and could not find out what the service that appeared on my bill was when I inquired last April, 2009. Now finally there was a description on my bill and when I called I learned that I have paid over $400.00 for a service I never signed up for and do not have any documentation on.