Yellow Page Listing

Did you Get your Check from them...

[herb]

Just received a check from "<a yellow-page site>". Official looking in the amount of $3.50.

Reading the fine print: If you cash the check you authorize them to, charge your phone bill, debit the bank account that the check was deposited into, or "other methods" for $17.95 per month for advertising on their web site.

Some one in accounting caught it, thanks be to the bean counters.

[edited by: rcjordan at 4:58 pm (utc) on Oct. 21, 2002]
[edit reason] no specifics, please [/edit]

[dingman]

I haven't seen it from a yellow pages site before, but I've seen the same scam by companies in other industries. If I don't know why a check came, I'm darned suspicious of what someone thinks they're buying from me. It's usually not something I'm willing to sell.

[mivox]

I think I switched long distance companies about a dozen times during college... they'd send checks for $10-$20 or so every few months, which authorized them to switch your long distance service if you cashed them.

I figured I didn't really care who carried my long distance calls, so I'd take myself out to dinner with it or buy cigarettes or something.

But they weren't charging me $17.95/month for the honor afterwards.

[dingman]

I wish that was where the ones I get were coming from. I'd happily let a company carry our long distance for $20, so long as there wasn't a monthly fee. We have a policy of only making long-distance calls on our cell phones anyway, so they wouldn't get a dime.