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Verizon to Repay $30M Over Unwanted Phone Personalization Charges

by Caleb Johnson on June 26, 2009 at 03:16 PM

In case you haven't heard, the country isn't exactly rolling in the money these days. Some fortunate Verizon customers in Florida might get an unexpected kickback, however, thanks to a court-ordered refund from the wireless provider after it falsely charged customers for products they didn't want.

According to Broadband, Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum reached an agreement with Verizon and Alltel (now owned by Verizon) to repay customers $30 million for ringtones, music, wallpaper, and other items they didn't want (or understand) they were purchasing. McCollum says online scammers were charging users as much as $19.99 a month for content that customers believed was free. As part of the agreement, Verizon is also required to change some of its practices to ensure customers aren't fooled by these kinds of scams in the future.

Sure, personalizing your phone is fun. Whether it's the latest and greatest iPhone app or an old-school ring tone, it's always a good idea to keep a watchful eye for service charges and recurring fees. Case in point: Venturing to some unfamiliar Web site with a dancing frog in order to download the new Young Jeezy tone probably means a couple more digits on the cell phone bill next month. [From Broadband, via Textually]

Tags: alltel, billing, business, cellphone, customerservice, florida, ringtones, scam, top, verizon

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