[asterisk-biz] VoicePulse engaged in very dubious business practices

[Andy Jefferson]

Voice Pulse , NuFone and others all use a common CLEC. I would expect
Voice Pulse to go tits up next. The CLEC is the one to watch out for.

On 6/1/06, David Pollak <dpp-asterisk at projectsinmotion.com> wrote:
> I had pre-paid, thus I did not close my account because it had a
> positive balance.  I explicitly turned off all auto-renew features.
> That means that I explicitly revoked any rights granted to the provider
> to charge my credit card, but they charged my card anyway.
>
> If there was a way to get a refund for pre-paid amounts, I would have
> taken that route.  However, if I've pre-paid and made it explicit that a
> provider does not have the authority to charge my credit card, then
> there's no legal argument that the provider should be able to charge my
> card.  If VoicePulse were a post-paid service or if I had used some
> loophole in their billing system to rack up huge charges, they would
> have a right to recoup the value of the services delivered.
>
> I've probably got more than $1,000 in prepaid services out to VoIP
> providers.  That's my cash that they're using.  Sometimes things don't
> work out the right way (e.g., VoicePulse's service problems, NuFone's
> 800 number problems) but that's a risk that I take by prepaying with
> small providers and I've got no hard feelings for the few dollars that
> have gone to providers who ultimately haven't provided the bargained for
> services.
>
> It's a whole different thing to not provide services that I've paid for,
> go charge me for additional services that I did not authorize, and then
> to argue that they have the right to charge my card.
>
> I'm not looking for sympathy.  I'm looking to warn the non-service
> providers to avoid VoicePulse because of their business practices.  I'm
> also giving the service providers on this list information about how one
> of their competitors treats customers.
>
>
>
> VoIP Dealer wrote:
> > David,
> >
> > You probably don't realize that you are posting a complaint about
> > something that has happened to 75% of the people that read this list...
> > not because they are customers, but because they are PROVIDERS.  Don't
> > expect much sympathy when you left the account open and they continued
> > to charge as expected.  If you don't tell your cable company you are
> > moving, you OWE them money whether or not you live there anymore of if
> > you "authorized" them.  You entered into a contract and are now
> > complaining when they enforced the contract on you.
> >
> > In the end, VoicePulse did the "right thing" from YOUR point of view,
> > gave you a refund and returned $41 that was rightfully theirs, so I
> > don't see what your complaint is at all.  Try to even get one of these
> > one-man shops on the phone for a refund and see what happens.
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > Do you Yahoo!?
> > Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail Beta.
> > <http://us.rd.yahoo.com/evt=40791/*http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/handraisers>
> >
> >
> >
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