Phoning Home: The $32.39 Surprise

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July 12, 2009

THE HAGGLER

By DAVID SEGAL Q. My mother was recently delayed while traveling and, not having her cellphone, called me collect in Ithaca, N.Y., from a pay phone in Newark Liberty International Airport. For a collect call lasting one or two minutes, I was charged $32.39 on my credit card. The company, Legacy LD International, never posted its rates or offered to explain its charges. Its customer service is rude and hostile. Why is an airport allowing it to operate there? The Internet is crawling with similar stories about this company. Would appreciate any help. Rahul Krishnan

A. Mr. Krishnan isn't kidding about the vast quantity of Legacy LD-related rage on the Internet. The company, which is based in Cypress, Calif., has generated so much ill will that when you Google its name, the first link is the collected fulminations of customers on a Web site called complaintsboard.com.

The complaints are variations on Mr. Krishnan's theme: "I got charged $31.09 for a five minute collect call from my boyfriend at a pay phone from Legacy LD INTL." "Legacy billed me $262.88 for five 3rd party calls ranging up to $11.62 per minute." Etc.

Those who demanded an explanation or a refund wound up even angrier. When Mr. Krishnan gave it a shot, he told the Haggler last week, he asked to speak to a supervisor and the customer service rep said: "You can try calling back later. But you'll probably just get me again."

The Haggler hears all this and thinks: It is on.

But before we commence the Three Stooges-style whoop and slap attack that is Legacy's due, a bit of back story. The company, it turns out, is basically a room full of telephone operators. The phone used by Mr. Krishnan's mother is actually owned by Global Tel Link, which last year won the rights to install and run pay phones in La Guardia, Kennedy and Newark Liberty airports, having submitted a winning bid to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Global then contracted with Legacy to handle operator services, and gets a cut of billing revenue.

Which, though dwindling, comes in startlingly large chunks, judged on a dollar-per-minute basis. In 1996, Congress essentially deregulated the price of pay-phone calls, hoping to make this shrinking business a little more enticing.

The upshot is that today, making a collect call on a pay phone is like stepping in one of those net traps that ensnare people in every other movie set in a jungle. Dial "0," ask for an operator and, suddenly, you're dangling from a rubber tree.

So Legacy is within its rights to charge huge sums. But, seriously, $32 for a quick collect call? And then brush-off rudeness on top of that? Is this how Legacy does business?

Initially, the Haggler had a hard time finding out. Calls to the company's media relations guy - yes, the guy whose job it is to return calls like the Haggler's - were not returned. There were a few more tries, and enough time on the line for the Haggler to all but memorize the company's on-hold voiceover patter, which refers unironically to Legacy's "sincere, honest customer support" and "problem-free communication services."

Ultimately, the customer service manager, Luis Garcia, got in touch. The Haggler conferenced in Mr. Krishnan, who is 21 and about to start teaching high school chemistry through Teach for America.

Mr. Krishnan opened by voicing his frustrations with rather admirable restraint, prompting Mr. Garcia to apologize in the vaguely mechanical tone of man who deals with the livid for a living. But Mr. Garcia also said his records show that the $32 call lasted for nine minutes, not two, and that because Mr. Krishnan has a Canadian phone number, he was charged the international call rate.

Mr. Krishnan agreed about the Canadian-ness of his cellphone - he hails from Calgary, Alberta - but he's adamant that he hurried his mother off the line right after she said her flight was delayed. Two minutes, tops.

For what it's worth, several of those ranting about Legacy at complaintsboard.com also cite disputes about the lengths of their calls.

We were at an impasse. But after more talking, Mr. Garcia tried his hand at an olive branch by offering to just rip up the Legacy rulebook and, yes, take 50 percent off this $32 bill. That's right, a $16 giveaway.

The Haggler suppressed a giggle, and Mr. Krishnan called this gesture insufficient.

Mr. Garcia said he could go as far as 75 percent off. Mr. Krishnan sounded less than impressed. Mr. Garcia then said, "Let me see what I can do." After a pause - for what, we know not - he agreed to a total refund.

On to the next question: what's up with our two enablers here, Global Tel Link and the Port Authority? Global Tel Link checked records and decided not only that Legacy had charged the correct sum, but that Mr. Krishnan had received a second call that day from Newark airport. (Suffice to say, he neither remembers nor was billed for it.)

A spokesman for the Port Authority took a couple days to offer up this cup of weak tea: "The Port Authority is looking into the matter."

Fair warning: you're on your own, people, and no matter where you call, or how long you talk, Legacy isn't cheap. Mr. Garcia says a typical five-minute state-to-state collect call using its operators costs about $17.

Caller beware.

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