FCC Fines GPSPS $9.065 Million For Illegally Billing Customers And Switching Their Phone Companies

The Federal Communications Commission has fined GPSPS, Inc., an Atlanta (GA) telephone company, $9,065,000 for switching consumers’ long distance carriers without their authorization (“slamming”), billing consumers for unauthorized charges (“cramming”), and submitting falsified evidence to government regulatory officials as “proof” that consumers had authorized the company to switch their long distance providers.

The Enforcement Bureau reviewed more than 150 complaints against GPSPS that consumers filed with the Commission, the Federal Trade Commission, the Public Utility Commission of Texas, and the Better Business Bureau. Consumers complained that GPSPS switched their long distance service provider without their authorization even though they had never heard of or spoken to the company before discovering GPSPS’s charges on their telephone bills. In many cases, GPSPS refused to refund all of the unauthorized fees it charged consumers. Instead, the company misrepresented to consumers that they or someone in their household had authorized GPSPS’s service, and that GPSPS possessed an audio recording evidencing the authorization. The audio “verification” recordings GPSPS mentioned to consumers were fake. GPSPS submitted these fabricated recordings to the Commission and state regulatory authorities as “proof” that the consumers authorized its service.