MCI - cancelled long distance service - then charged $ 5.00 per minute from MCI - was promised to get credits that were never received

Complaints.com received the following on March 28, 2003:

From: subeach [Email User]

RE: MCI - cancelled long distance service - then charged $ 5.00 per minute from MCI - was promised to get credits that were never received

Several months ago, I canceled my long distance service with MCI. I did this to keep my ex room mate from making long distance calls from my phone, as i was paying the bill and he was making numerous calls out of state. I thought if i cancelled my long distance, that this individual would not be able to make calls from my phone; I was never informed otherwise.

My room mate continued to make calls without my knowledge, and the calls were still billed through MCI, but now at a rate of $5 per each 1 minute call. Needless to say, I was shocked when I got the bill; a bill that I am not able to pay. I called MCI and had to go through several people until I finally got a supervisor.

This supervisor seemed to understand my complaint and said that the charges would be credited and then talked me into re-establishing my long distance service with MCI, which I was willing to do only because she was going to credit the past charges that accumulated while i didn't have a long distance carrier. Well, 2 months went by, and the charges kept appearing on my phone bill.. She did say it would take a couple of billing cycles for the charges to be credited, so i just paid my local telephone company and waited longer for the credit. It never happened.

Then MCI interrupted my long distance service and I have been without service for a couple of weeks. During this time, my ex room mate has left town and there is no way to recoup the money from him. I called MCI again and had to go through several people, and many hours on the phone before getting a supervisor named Erin. He said that I was responsible for these charges and the request for them to be credited was denied, though i was never informed of this. He said he reviewed the situation and it was against MCI policy to credit any charges.

I spoke with another person in customer service and attempted to find out the name of the female supervisor who told me that the charges would be credited; of course they could not give me this information. I was given an address of their main headquarters in Iowa and the customer service rep said i could write to them in attempt to find out the name of the person who promised the credit.

I mailed a letter to them today, but of course i don't expect a response. I think that $5 per minute on long distance is robbery and the practices of MCI are deceptive and unfair. Please be wary before doing any business with this company.