64055 / 01183244333 Scam. You're not alone!

BradJones1192

Over the course of 2 or 3 days, I was sent multiple texts from this number and was told to reply STOP to 64055.
Naturally, I was reluctant to do so as I thought that's how the whole scammed worked, in getting you to actually panic and reply, only to actually be charged £4.50.

Anyways, a few days and texts from the first initial text, I thought I'd just check my bill anyway, as I getting concerned with the number of texts I was receiving.

My eyes nearly fell out when I came to discover I was being charged £55 for something I had no idea about. It's nothing short of daylight robbery.

I got on the phone to my network provider (Three) and was told to contact the landline number provided in the text (Which, to my surprise, was free). When I finally got through, the woman on the other end immediately knew what I was calling about and told me she had requested a stop to any further texts. However, when I asked for a refund, she declined and told me that I had 'used' the services... How exactly? I'd love to know.

Thereafter, I got back on the phone to Three and told them they had canceled the subscriptions but had refused me a refund. Very kindly, the gentleman said he'd waive the charges from my bill and gave me a word of warning, despite me not having done anything to my knowledge of subscribing to anything.

If you are unfortunately receiving these texts, do not ignore them. And do not reply STOP either: this will only charge you even further. Do what I have done and you should be well on your way to having it sorted.
I know most phone network providers won't be as kind in offering a refund but believe me, I had to call a good few times before it was offered.

Sorry for the story, but this scam truly is shocking, and I can imagine it's conning innocent people out of thousands on a daily basis. One last thing, there is usually more than one number to contact these scammers if you are reluctant to do so via the one in the text. My network provider gave me the additional one, but I also found it by searching '64055 text' on Google.

Good luck.

Frozen_up_north

It was nice to hear that Three cancelled the charges from these fraudsters.

We have our Three accounts set to to zero overspend via the user settings on the My3 web site. Hopefully it will stop reverse charge text scams, it certainly stops out of bundle texting to foreign mobiles.

[Deleted User]

How exactly did you 'subscribe' in the first place?

BradJones1192

@FrozenUpNorth - I had my spending capped to zero too. If I had tried call a premium rate number, Three wouldn't let me, yet they still allowed these charges to happen.

When I asked why the spending cap didn't prevent the charges, I was told "because the texts are from a 'third party'", thus they have no control.

Sounds a load of nonsense to me, but it made me even more aware how serious this scam is.
They must be using some sort of loophole to make the charges.

BradJones1192

@Colin_Maybe - Beats me. I don't think there's one exact answer either. I was told there were many different ways, by Three's customer service.

mobilejunkie

I'm not on Three, but maybe the limit is only set on the bundle - and premium rate numbers aren't part of the bundle.

Ian011

If you receive a text from a premium rate five-digit mobile shortcode, you must send the STOP message to end the subscription or call the premium rate service provider to get them to end it.

The charge for sending the STOP message is "one standard rate message" and is levied by the caller's mobile phone provider. Failure to end the subscription means the premium rate service provider continues to take £4.50 forever.

Consumer law requires retailers and traders to have an 01, 02, 03 or 080 number for after-sales issues and enquires such as cancellations and refunds. The 0118 number was inclusive in your calls allowance. It was not 'free'.

The advice to never reply applies only when you receive spam text messages from 07 mobile numbers.

skyline

Ian011 wrote: »

If you receive a text from a premium rate five-digit mobile shortcode, you must send the STOP message to end the subscription or call the premium rate service provider to get them to end it.

The charge for sending the STOP message is "one standard rate message" and is levied by the caller's mobile phone provider. Failure to end the subscription means the premium rate service provider continues to take £4.50 forever.

Consumer law requires retailers and traders to have an 01, 02, 03 or 080 number for after-sales issues and enquires such as cancellations and refunds. The 0118 number was inclusive in your calls allowance. It was not 'free'.

The advice to never reply applies only when you receive spam text messages from 07 mobile numbers.

No, you're wrong.

I replied with STOP and contacted them via their web form. They told me "I have now cancelled this service for you, so you will not receive further text messages or charges from today's date". A few days later they took another £4.50.

I did a factory reset of my phone just in case it was some malware sending off texts but it's still happening.

I've complained to The Phone-paid Services Authority but I haven't even had a confirmation email from them.

Ian011

The above is the correct procedure to end the subscription from a legitimate premium rate subscription service. All of the facts, as stated, are correct.

In your case, you appear to be dealing with a premium rate service provider that signs people up in a fraudulent manner and then ignores requests to end the subscription. That's a whole other matter.

You have made the correct first step in reporting this to PSA. As this is the Christmas/New Year period with multiple Bank Holidays, it may take a few days to receive an acknowledgement or reply.

Frosty78

So I've done a bit of digging into this.

Go to: psauthority.org.uk and type in your number on the number check form.

You will get back contact details of the company that own it.

64546 is apparently owned by AirG (different to what the PSA say) - I think they all lead back to the scumbags at txtNation.

Or search Google for "network name" text scam - you'll soon find what you need.

O2 have been useless. They told me to contact each company and get a refund.

O2 don't seem to realise that the I'm paying them the charge but they wont refund me it as it's nothing to do with them (BS).

But on my bill (from O2) there's a charge! But it's nothing to do with O2... idiots.

On txtNation is clearly states they share profits with the phone the Networks but again it's nothing to do with O2.

Get this.. this is how much of a scam they know it is and cover themselves.

My 3yr old clicked a link on a webpage. The webpage clearly used auto form filling for the phone number so a 3ry old wouldn't have to type it in.

Here's a quote from txtNation:
"txtNation advertisements clearly state that children must seek parental approval before subscribing to any services."

My 3yr can't F'ing read txtNation! He's just wants to click the screen and play games! He doesn't say "Oh daddy can I get you approval on this !!!!!! game so the company can screw you out of some cash" he's 3 txtNation!

To be honest we're all pretty screwed because the phone networks wont disable this feature because they make money form it, so bend over and let them have there way with you.

I'm submitting complaints to all the authorities out of principle.

O2 (and other networks) should take ownership of this scam and refuse to allow it.

mobilejunkie

It all begs the question of why on earth anyone would let a 3-year old (or a 15 year old for that matter) have access to a smartphone. You may as well hand them a chequebook of signed cheques. There are lots of scumbags and con-artists and regulation generally is crap - therefore people need to be far more careful in how (and who) uses their phones. In many cases the phones (and the people at the other end) are smarter than their users.