[legion]

I'm at lunch with some work friends last Wednesday. I get a call on my cell phone from a blocked number. I only answer it because calls from work come up as blocked numbers and it could be a work emergency.

The person on the other end of the line sounds to be a black gentleman who is reading from a script. He informs me (I think--it was hard to hear over the crowd at Panera) that I have won a $250 credit on my Nextel account to be applied towards anything I like: new phones, or just to pay my bill. He asks me to verify my name, address, and last 4 of my SSN. I figure fine, if it's legit, no problem. If it's a scam, they can get that information anyway and they can't get a loan in my name without my full SSN. Besides, I have a password on my Nextel account that prevents anyone from making changes (adding lines, ordering new phones, changing addresses, etc...) without the password.

Or so I thought. Apparently, some Nextel customer service reps can be persuaded to make changes without the password...

I get a call on Thursday from a Nextel fraud rep that someone has ordered two high-end phones and two additional lines on my account. They contacted me not because the person ordering did not have my password (they did not), but because this scam is preying on people in my area. The Nextel rep the fraudsters talked to changed my mailing address (but not my billing address) and my password.

Now, Nextel says they will not remove the charges unless I send them the phones back, which they say were sent to my address.

The way I see it, they screwed up and didn't follow their own procedures, and I shouldn't be liable whether or not they get their phones back.