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

[Zac Amsler]

Wow.. Nice to know.

Cheers,
-- 
Zac Amsler, Network Operations
NetIQ Systems, LLC www.netiqsys.net <http://www.netiqsys.net>
US48 $.013/min, Canada OnNet $.008, Competitive A-Z Rates.
Please Contact for more information.


David Pollak wrote:
> Folks,
> 
> I've been using various VoIP services for over 2 years.  I've used just 
> about every one.
> 
> I had been using VoicePulse Connect which worked fine with IAX.  I 
> switched over to using SIP for various reasons.  VoicePulse's support 
> for SIP was very, very weak.  On a daily basis, I had to call 
> VoicePulse's technical support to get them to reboot the SIP server so 
> that my Asterisk instance would stay registered with VP's servers.
> 
> Ultimately, I gave up on using VoicePulse.  I turned off auto-renew.  I 
> deleted all the DIDs (or so I thought) that I had with VoicePulse.
> 
> Yesterday, I got my credit card statement and VoicePulse charged me 
> $41.03.  I called and asked why they charged me.  "Your account dropped 
> below the minimum amount, so we charged your card."  "But I disabled 
> auto-renew."  "It doesn't matter, our terms of service allow us to 
> charge your card."  (this is a new feature of the new terms of service 
> and not the terms of service that I agreed to when I originally signed 
> up with VoicePulse.)  This went on for about 30 minutes.  At a certain 
> point, I started asking for a supervisor.  After spending (I kid you 
> not) 5 minutes screaming "Are you f**king deaf, connect me with your 
> supervisor," the rep finally connected me with a supervisor.
> 
> Turns out that I hadn't canceled one of the DIDs on one of my VoicePulse 
> accounts.  Even though I hadn't accessed VoicePulse in more than 6 
> months (for termination or origination) and despite that I had turned 
> off auto-renew, VoicePulse charged my account.  Here's the rub.  The 
> credit card associated with the account that had the DID is an old card 
> and the number is no longer valid, so VoicePulse looked at my other 
> accounts until they found a card that was valid and charged that card.
> 
> After a 15 minute discussion with the supervisor, I made the point clear 
> that either VoicePulse could refund my money or I'd dispute the charge 
> (disputes cost merchants a lot of money.)  Finally, the supervisor 
> refunded $41.
> 
> I would strongly recommend against giving VoicePulse your credit card 
> number.  They charge credit cards without authorization.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> David