Receiving "Trivia" Texts - Dont Want Them - Are they costing Me??

SuperMum2008

I received a text last week to my mobile telling me I was subscribed to a trivia texting service at 9 pounds a week. There was a number for me to reply to to stop the service. As I had no recollection of ever being so foolish as to sign up to such a service, I just deleted the message, presuming it was some sort of scam. Thismorning however a trivia text has arrived with my first piece of trivia. Does anyone know if this is a scam to be ignored or should I try to find some way of stopping them. If so, how do I stop them? I dont ever remember entering my bank details or agreeing to the payment on any website or anything like that, but am a bit worried?

Jon_01

You keep getting them and being charged until you text STOP back to the number their coming from.

Comyface

Yes, text STOP as soon as you can.

Don't worry about your bank details, they get their money as a fee on your mobile phone bill. Or if you're on PAYG, it'll reduce your balance by that amount each time.

Soubrette

SuperMum2008 wrote: »

I received a text last week to my mobile telling me I was subscribed to a trivia texting service at 9 pounds a week. There was a number for me to reply to to stop the service. As I had no recollection of ever being so foolish as to sign up to such a service, I just deleted the message, presuming it was some sort of scam. Thismorning however a trivia text has arrived with my first piece of trivia. Does anyone know if this is a scam to be ignored or should I try to find some way of stopping them. If so, how do I stop them? I dont ever remember entering my bank details or agreeing to the payment on any website or anything like that, but am a bit worried?

If you ignore it you will continue getting texts and will probably be charged for it. Do you have a PAYG (your balance is probably diminishing) or a pay monthly (it will be on your bill), if the latter is set up on ddm then it will be paid from your bank.

It's a bit complicated but it seems to me from my investigations that your mobile phone provider such as Orange gets the money from you, passes it on to the Intermediary such as Dialogue Communication who passes it on to the actual company texting you.

Text 'STOP' as soon as possible.

If you do not remember signing up for this service then contact phonepayplus on their freephone number and tell them the shortcode - mine was 83373. They will be able to tell you who is providing the service and also the intermediary such as Dialogue Communications who sold them the short code. I was not able to contact the company sending the texts direct after texting "stop" as their landline number was an answermachine. I spoke to Dialogue who dealt with it, they checked to see how I subscribed and admitted that it didn't seem as if I had. They then organised a refund for me, the texting company (some horoscope thing) refunded £5.00.

I still made an online complaint to phonepayplus for unsolicited texts and I also complained to my MP.

Orange were rubbish - took no responsibility whatsoever - so long as they're raking in their cut :rolleyes: and advised they could not even block these premium rates texts.

Good luck and please don't leave it hoping it will go away.

Sou

Intasun32

Soubrette wrote: »

Orange were rubbish - took no responsibility whatsoever - so long as they're raking in their cut :rolleyes: and advised they could not even block these premium rates texts.

When your contract comes up for renewal it may be of help to know that both T-Mobile & Vodafone will place a block on the short codes that these thieves use to take money from our accounts by means of unsolicited reverse bill texts.

As Soubrette has said no one will help, the networks, Phonepayplus, & Ofcom as they all take a cut. Even our MP's turn a blind eye, why? Because The Inland Revenue, aka our Government take VAT @ 15%.

:mad:

SuperMum2008

Thanks to all your replies - my husband texted STOP before I could do it myself! I have also lodged a complaint with Payphoneplus who I had never heard of before this, so thankyou for that info too - for others, their site is:

http://www.phonepayplus.org.uk/output/for-the-public.aspx