Corporate America tries to Survive Struggling Economy by Ripping Off Struggling Consumers

Dear Sir/Madam:

With the current state of the economy, people have never been more aware of their own finances than now.  The recession has brought on a wave of anguish and anxiety that has affected the entire country, but none more than the average working class American-  people with mortgages, loans and a family to care for.

Amid all the fears concerning job stability and making ends meet, why now, does the average American have yet another reason to worry?  While consumers continue to toil in this unstable economy, Corporate America has continued to exhibit deceptive business practices at an alarming rate.  More and more, corporations are demonstrating deceptive billing practices and other dishonest behavior in an effort to maintain profit margins in this failing economy.  This appalling behavior became much more apparent to me after being overcharged hundreds of dollars by my long-time wireless carrier, T-Mobile.

From 2002-2009, I was a loyal customer who paid her bills on time and was pretty much content with the service I received.  This all changed this past March, when I discovered I was billed for ~$500+ in overages for text-messages.  This charge came as a surprise to me since I had contacted customer support to have this service reverted to unlimited, which was confirmed by the representative I spoke with at the time.

When I contacted T-Mobile customer service, I was stunned to find that I was met with adversity, where the representatives refused to listen to me, or rationally address any of my concerns.  To make matters worse, the higher up the corporate ladder I went, the more I was ignored.  The T-Mobile representatives were rude and condescending, constantly speaking over me and not allowing me to speak.  Instead of the courteous and understanding treatment, you would come to expect of customer service, I was yelled at, and spoken to like a child.  To my astonishment, when I stated that I really hope to resolve the issue without having to resort to litigation, the representative scoffed at me and told me he would see me in court, amongst other things.

After my mind-numbing encounter with this belligerent representative, I decided to do a little online investigation to see if any other consumers have experienced similar situations.  Like me, a number of people have been victims of deceptive billing, lying customer representatives, and have even encountered similar rude representatives.  Most of these instances have resulted in T-Mobile unfairly tossing the accounts of many loyal customers of several years into collections.

In addition to my ongoing dispute with T-Mobile, I have also experienced many other examples of deceptive business practices, which is becoming more frequent.  In the past month alone, I can name two instances of business deception that would disgust any consumer.  In one instance, I received a check in the mail from a company where I used to buy and sell my textbooks.  I found it strange that I was receiving a random $5.00 check and upon further inspection, I discovered a block of fine print, written in light gray, situated beneath the endorsement line.  The fine print stated that upon endorsement of the check, that the endorsee authorizes the company to withdraw $150 from their checking account, every month, for the next two years. The most appalling part about this is the fact that the company is known for selling and buying textbooks; that in itself implied that they were aiming at college students.


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