The Very Special Sprint Screw Job
This is how Sprint treats people. Think about this before you use them. This is a copy of a real complaint filed with the Federal Communications Commission against Sprint:
Dear FCC,
I would like to hereby file a formal complaint against Sprint. In short, I have been the victim of identity theft, and Sprint has been stunningly unresponsive and indifferent to resolving this matter. They have negatively impacted my credit report, and refuse to take responsibility for their mistake and remove the incorrect negative credit report they filed against me.
Here are the full details:
On or about February 4, 2005, I received a collection letter from AFNI, a collection agency in the employ of Sprint. The letter read in part, “We are making another attempt to contact you regarding your overdue account.” As I am not now, nor have I ever been a Sprint customer, and as this was the first contact made by AFNI, I was puzzled and confused. So, I picked up the phone and called them. The essence of the 20 minute conversation is that the person or persons in Los Angeles, Calif., who have been fraudulently using my name and social security number for years, obtained some kind of service from Sprint, ran up a bill, and ignored all attempts by Sprint to collect. Eventually Sprint sent the account to AFNI for collections, and somehow AFNI found me in Antelope, a suburb of Sacramento, 400 miles away from Los Angeles. I explained that I am the victim of an ongoing identity theft problem, and that I did not make the charges. I was told at least a half dozen times by AFNI that they did not care about the identity theft – they had my name and social security number and I was going to pay no matter what. They did promise to send me some kind of “fraud kit” that I could use to dispute the charges, but even then, they warned me, I had to pay the bill.
On or about February 7 I spent the better part of 90 minutes on the phone trying to get someone at Sprint to work with me to resolve this problem. The Sprint Fraud Department has an automated phone answering system that is nearly impossible to navigate, with the result being that they have erected a powerful barrier to keep the public from reaching them.
Giving up on trying to reach someone in the Sprint Fraud Department, I eventually reached a person at Sprint who claimed to be a Supervisor in the Customer Care Unit. I explained what was going on, and he promised to write out my story and send it to the Sprint Fraud Department for me. After making me repeat the story, he said he had made adequate notes to get the ball rolling with the Fraud Department. He promised he would send the report over that same day, and he promised that someone from the Sprint Fraud Department would get back to me within 72 hours.
Several weeks later, as no one from any Sprint department had contacted me, and as the promised Fraud Kit from AFNI still had not arrived, I worked diligently through the automated phone answering barrier system at the Sprint Fraud Department, and by sheer perseverance I eventually reached a live Fraud Department employee. She told me the Fraud Department had never received any report from Customer Care about my fraud case. She also said that even if they had, they would not have called me as, and I quote, “It is not the policy of the Sprint Fraud Department to return calls.” I told her my story, and she said she would send me a Fraud Kit that I could complete and return to dispute the charges.
After another week, when the two promised fraud kits had not arrived, I called Customer Care again, and told the entire story to yet another person claiming to be a Supervisor. She said that she was not surprised, as Sprint was having, and again I quote, “A lot of problems with the Fraud Department.” She said that Sprint had now set up a brand-new fraud department within Customer Care because the Fraud Department was not getting the job done. She had me repeat my story, took notes (or at least made sounds like she was taking notes) and told me she would put the report on the desk of the Customer Care Fraud Department and that they would call me back in a day or so to get this resolved.
When yet another week had gone by and the two promised fraud kits and the promised phone call did not come, I tried to call the Sprint Corporate Office, thinking that perhaps Sprint officials higher up on the corporate ladder might have some interest about how Sprint personnel were mistreating fraud victims. I was sent by the operator to a man who said he could help me – that he wanted to help me. He listened attentively to my entire story, then told me to hold on and transferred me to the Fraud Department, thereby disabusing me of any notion that Sprint corporate officials care at all about average Americans who were trying to resolve a problem with Sprint.
Jim in the Fraud Department listened to my entire story, and told me he would fax the proper form to me right then. That was March 16, and he did indeed fax over the form. The form, in addition to requiring the expected information needed to identify me and the account, requires:
A copy of my social security card
A copy of my driver’s license
A copy of the police report
Proof of residence
And, everything needs to be notarized.
The form from Sprint clearly states that if any of the documents are not provided, or the statement is not notarized, they will not process the form.
I was happy, nay eager, to get the form, complete it and return it so Sprint could advise the credit reporting agencies that they had mistakenly dinged my credit report. However, making copies of all the required documents is going to take time and money. Further, having the statement notarized is going to take more time and money.
I am agreeable to taking reasonable and rational steps to resolve this dispute and clear my credit standing. However, the documentation demanded by Sprint exceeds all “reasonable and normal standards.” Going to such extreme lengths to prove who I am is unnecessary and is clearly another obstacle Sprint has erected in an effort to deflect honest efforts to clear up these types of problems. If they think that anyone other than the fraud victim would go to the lengths that I have gone to in attempting to resolve this issue then they must surly think the moon is made of green cheese. They are asking for identity proof far in excess of what the government asks for a passport, which is the ultimate form of identification.
Further, the requirement that the statement be notarized is another barrier to resolution put in place for no rational business reason. No one but the fraud victim is going to bother to fill out the form. Demanding notarization is unreasonable and unnecessary.
I am the victim here. A person, or persons, in Los Angeles has been using my name and social security card for at least 3 years fraudulently. I have been forced to monitor my credit reports constantly. I have had to close bank accounts. I have had to close credit cards. I have filled out endless forms to clear my name and never, ever, have I been asked to jump through the hoops Sprint is demanding. It is, to my mind, analogous to a police department telling a rape victim that she has to drive herself to a hospital and pay for a rape test and bring that back, after getting it notarized, before the police will take any action on the complaint. This analogy and what Sprint is demanding is unreasonable and absolutely unacceptable.
What has now happened is that I have been victimized twice. First by whoever used my name to open an account with Sprint, and then again by Sprint who slammed my credit rating by telling the world that I failed to pay a bill with them. There is little I can do about the person or persons in Los Angeles who continue to use my name and social security number. I am asking the FCC to help me with Sprint.
Specifically, I would like the FCC to investigate Sprint and determine if the policies and procedures in place to resolve identity theft complaints are adequate and reasonable. I believe you will find them to be neither. Further, I ask the FCC to set guidelines for all companies under FCC prevue so that this does not happen to any other American. Identity theft is a growing problem in America, and we all have to fight against it. But being victimized a second time by an uncaring and unresponsive company like Sprint is beyond the pale. They should be working with identity theft victims, not against us.
I intend to fill out the Sprint form, send reasonable documentation and a copy of this letter to Sprint and demand that they immediately notify the credit bureaus that they have wrongly and mistakenly sent a negative credit statement to them about me. If Sprint does not take appropriate remedial action to correct their mistake in a reasonable amount of time, I will contact your office again.
I also intend to write my Congressional delegation asking them to take a hard look at measures that can be taken to rein in identify theft, and also to legislate that companies not be allowed to slam the credit rating of identity theft victims, and further, that companies take responsibility for their actions in regards individual’s credit ratings. I will send them a copy of this letter to you.
Huge corporations like Sprint routinely and cavalierly send negative credit reports, and when confronted with an error – a mistakenly sent negative credit report – they should take immediate action to correct their mistake. Instead, what I discovered at Sprint was a mind-boggling indifference. That they made a mistake that negatively impacted my credit rating is of no concern to Sprint, and if I have to hire an attorney to force them to correct their error they could care less.
This uncaring and dehumanizing attitude must change.
Please accept my thanks, in advance, for your help with this problem.
Kindest regards,
Steve Berlin
posted by Ray Ders @ 1:06 PM
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