Virgin Mobile USA, Inc. Virgin Mobile Overcharges minutes Warren New Jersey

To Bill in L.A.

When I was VM CSR, (2007-2008) I personally witnessed what I call "system creep" in Virgin Mobile's billing many, many times.
This is best illustrated when a customer starts a brand new account with Virgin Mobile, but, for whatever reason, does not program a phone right away to go with the account.

So, a few hours later, or maybe even the next day, the customer gets his phone, gets it charged up, gets in their hand and calls for programming instructions.....routine.
I bring up the account on the computer,
and I see a brand new account with fresh heap of minutes on it, minus 2 minutes!
Every time I saw this happen it was always 2 minutes.

Many other times a customer would activate a new phone and create a new account, but accidentally give us the wrong serial number (ESN) from the phone.
This does not hurt, or cost the account, it just means the phone wont work.
There is no way that phone is going to work with the wrong ESN plugged into the account....ever.
So, of course the customer calls back for trouble shooting.
On trouble shooting I see that the ESN is off by a digit or 2, which is a pretty common mistake and is easily fixed,
but the account is also missing 2 minutes of time.....an account that has never had a working phone!

We are not allowed to discuss this unless the customer brings it up.
I only ever had one customer notice that his brand new account with no phone calls on it was missing 2 minutes.
Of course I gave the guy a 2 minute credit and apologized for the "mistake" made by VM's automation.

Now, System Creep is not to be confused with the well known policy of rounding UP to the nearest minute.
For example, if you talk for 30 seconds you get billed a minute, for 1 minute and 1 second you pay 2 minutes and so on.
Virgin Mobile and most other carriers are pretty up front about that policy and it is no secret.

There are other things that can cause small call "run-ons", like if you hang up at the end of a call, but the other person does not? This can cause the call to continue after you think it ended.
Any kind of run-on, small or large can be disputed by a VM CSR, in fact, there is a special software page for and it is very easy to do.
It is called "Disputes".
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To Denise in Buena Park

Those 5 digit numbers you saw in your call log are called Short Codes.
For a fairly complete list of short codes and who they belong to look here :
(http://www.usshortcodeswhois.com/index.php)
Short codes are like mini phone numbers that can be used as addresses in SMS (text messaging) service.
flycell.com, jamster, and blinko are the worst. I was always chasing down phantom $9.99 charges because the customer opted into monthly billing for ring tones without realizing it.

The thing that customers don't realize is that those "free" ring tone offers found on the web, in magazines, and on TV and on Virgin Mobile's web site contain fine print that says, in part, by accepting the terms and downloading the first free ring tone that they agree to be billed $9.99 a month for more ring tones later.

Some companies send unsolicited text messages to the customers phone offering a subscription declaring that if the customer does not opt out of the offered subscription by responding to the short code, then the customers phone account will be billed $9.99 every month.

I am pretty sure that's what burned down your balance so fast.
The Virgin Mobile policy on this, as it was taught to me is :
1 - Do not offer a refund for these charges.
2 - Advise customer that third party charges are not refundable.
3 - Advise customer to contact third party for a refund. There should be a phone number or an email address associated with the short code. Just text HELP to the short code to get info.
3 - Review customers account. I would look to see if that customer was new, and if it was a one time thing, I would put the money back on and explain how to avoid that kind of thing in the future along with a verbal reminder to the customer that you download at your own risk and are responsible for all costs, unintended or not.

I know, it's disgusting and I hated it, those third parties and VM profit from the ones that don't complain.

Hope that helps.

I also have had negative dealing with Virgin Mobile. I topped up $20.00 and when I checked my acct. activity it showed that I had used $2.05 but my phone was telling me that acct. balance was low and it was time to top up. It was showing a balance of a little over $4.00 I printed out my acct. activity that evening and by the next morning there were suddenly other "mystery calls" on my acct. One of them was repeated 4 or 5 times, but the # was only 5 digits long. My first and only call that morning was approx. 3 minutes long and I was out of time. I have written them 3 letters so far. This is the second time that I have caught them doing this in less then 2 months. I have a feeling that this company has been doing this all along.
With no notice or even an apology for their mishandling of my money they refunded some amount to my phone that wasn't correct. It took over 2 weeks. It just appeared. This time I have asked to be contacted. But since Im out of minutes and refuse to buy more minutes so they can do this again, I am anxious to see how they respond...if at all.