Aussie grandma “gobsmacked” after receiving outrageous $75,000 phone bill
An Aussie grandmother and small business owner is up against her telco after receiving a phone bill for the shocking amount of $75,000.
Debra Wilhelms has been the owner of her vacuum cleaner shop for 14 years, and her previous phone bill for her company was just over $300.
When she received the outrageous bill from telco Commander in November, she was completely “gobsmacked”.
Debra immediately asked to see the call log, which Commander finally provided after three months.
The log reveals hundreds of expensive calls made to foreign countries, with multiple calls being made at the same time.
The log even included calls from Debra’s fax, which has no phone attached to it.
Commander demanded that she pay the bill.
Debra said she had been sent disconnection notices, even though that is not allowed when a bill is in dispute.
“We were disconnected at one point," she said.
Debra contacted the telecommunications ombudsman but was told to withdraw her complaint because her phone bill exceeded $50,000.
The ombudsman advised Debra to seek legal advice if Commander didn’t waive the bill.
"That bill should just go away," she said.
"We've paid all our other bills, we paid the normal fees that we should pay, it's only those fraudulent calls that have not been paid, everything has been paid or paid on time."
Luke Sutton from the Communications Consumer Action Network said he had never heard of a situation like this before.
He said that Commander had a duty of care to act, rather than ignore Debra’s situation.
"We encourage the provider to work closely with the consumer and get this dispute resolved, and this is especially important in cases where there is fraud or scam charged on the bill," he said.
Debra said she was determined to fight the bill until the nightmare was resolved.
Commander has now said it will resolve Debra’s issue, saying the company take fraud awareness seriously.
"While privacy requirements restrict us from discussing the details of the customer without their written permission, we are confident that we can resolve this complaint to the satisfaction of the customer, and we apologise that this was not done earlier," a spokesperson said.
Have you ever received a bill for an outrageous amount by mistake? Tell us in the comments below.
Image credit: Nine News