Ah, the guy was roaming in Mexico. I missed that. To me it sounded like the guy went to Mexico and left his phone at home where his nephew picked it up. This causes me to have a smidgen more sympathy for Verizon et al, but it does little to soften my recently acquired anti-corporation position. The Exceptionally Smart Consumer Burt says stop blaming corporations and read my account agreements. He's right, I usually don't. I grew up trusting. That's how I was raised. And for most of my life my trust was rewarded, until about 7 years ago. My Well Fargo's agreement surely said there was an overdraft fee, but when I did have an overdraft I was charged a fee every day my account stayed negative. By the time I noticed... I switched to WaMu. 6 years ago I did a balance tranfer. To Chase. After the the transfer, Chase doubled my general rate to something between 25% and 30%. I called. They said it was due a change to my credit history. A balance transfer. Theirs. I switched to US Bank. So against my will, corporations are slowly turning me into a smart consumer. I no longer have a cell phone.