Long-Distance Client ‘Theft’ Common

There’s one very easy way for long-distance telephone companies to get new customers: Steal them.

Margaret Horton of Escondido came home from vacation recently and found a long-distance bill from American Telephone & Telegraph, even though she had long been a US Sprint subscriber. She called AT&T;, and the clerk’s initial response to her complaint was “they do it to us all the time.”

Four hours and many phone calls later, Horton was able to get switched back to Sprint at no charge. But she remains indignant that her long-distance service could be switched without her permission.

“They just stole us, kidnapped us. The whole thing infuriated me,” Horton said. “And nine times out of 10 they probably get away with it.”

Duane Filer, a telecommunications supervisor for the California Public Utilities Commission consumer affairs branch, said the agency gets about 10 complaints a week in Los Angeles alone from customers who were switched to another carrier without their permission, and he noted that most consumers wouldn’t even think to call the PUC.

Changes on Computer Tapes

Regulators and others believe that the problem of customer theft is rooted in the use by competing long-distance phone companies of independent sales agents. The agents are often compensated on a commission basis according to how many customers they sign up, and they can simply say that a customer has agreed to switch and pass the name along to the long-distance company.

That company, in turn, periodically transfers a computer tape containing the names and numbers of new subscribers to a local telephone company such as Pacific Bell or GTE California, where the switch is actually performed. A Pacific Bell spokeswoman said the long-distance company is supposed to have written authorization for any changes, but that authorization does not have to be produced for Pac Bell to make the switch.

Another type of marketing abuse involves sales agents who use misleading explanations to persuade customers to sign the form that authorizes the switch. At a recent street festival in New York, for example, US Sprint agents touted 30 minutes of free long-distance calls without indicating that signing up for the promotion meant switching carriers.

Customers soon begin receiving long-distance bills from a different company after the switch is made. But since long-distance calls would be made just as before--and many people aren’t very attentive to the intricacies of the modern telephone bill--not all customers are aware that they’ve been stolen.

Switched Back at No Charge

“This has been a fairly consistent problem since 1984,” said Ken McEldowney, executive director of San Francisco-based Consumer Action.

When a customer complains, the local telephone company asks to see a signed change authorization, and if the long-distance company can’t produce one, the customer is switched back at no charge.

Officials at AT&T;, MCI Communications and Sprint acknowledged that customer theft has been a problem, and all said they have quality-control programs to prevent abuses by marketing agents. PUC and Federal Communications Commission officials in Washington said they regularly talk with the companies about the problem, and that if it grows worse, legal action could result.