If you are reading this post, chances are you already know what PlayPhone is. I first got to know PlayPhone when I was casually checking my AT&T bills on the AT&T website, then to my horror I found out I have been paying $14.99 a month for this PlayPhone service I never signed up for!!! If you have received random texts from 778-88 then just to know that you are paying $14.99 every month for that…
If you want to confirm whether you have this monthly subscription or not, login to your AT&T account. Then click My Account -> Bill & Payments -> Bill Summary -> Usage Details -> Comm Charges. You will end up seeing something like the following. BTW, you can also look at your electronic monthly bills online, or your actual paper bills to see this same piece of information.
Now, this is how you can cancel that subscription. I have tried it myself so it is working as of now in June, 2010.
1. Send a text message “STOP” to 778-88.
You should get a response immediately after.
2. Send an email to customercare@allpp.com. Tell them you want to cancel your PlayPhone plan and your phone number is ______.
You should immediately get an auto-reply:
Just a note to inform you that your email has been received and will be reviewed by an agent shortly. As always, we welcome your ideas, comments, questions and requests. We respond to all inquiries within 48 hours and appreciate your patience during this process.
We thank for the opportunity to serve you and for choosing PlayPhone as your media content provider.
Regards,
PlayPhone Customer Care
3. Receive your confirmation email
This took me 3 hours after the auto-reply.
Dear XXX,
Thank you for contacting Mobile Support. We apologize for the inconveniences you are experiencing with our service. As requested, our records show as of 06/15/2010 the account# 1234567890 has been cancelled and removed from our system.
Again, we would like to apologize for the difficulties you experienced with our service. We are continually working to obtain new and exciting content and hope that you will come back and visit us in the near future for your media content needs. Should you have any questions or need further assistance, please feel free to contact us. Thank you for contacting Mobile Support.
John Smith
Customer Care Specialist
Mobile Support
4. (Optional) If you are paranoid, Call (866) 853-9793 between 5 a.m. and 10 p.m. PST to talk directly with a PlayPhone customer service representative to double check.
Hooray! You just saved yourself $14.99 every month! Good job!
Ref link: http://www.ehow.com/how_5106187_cancel-playphone-plan.html
From user comments:
- Blanche: The customer service number for ATT cellular is 800-331-0500.
BrianChan.us 
This is great if it would work. I did all of the above and am still getting charged and playphone says I am not subscribed.
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Hi Kristen, to my surprise I found out that my PlayPhone subscription got renewed automatically. I called AT&T’s customer service and told them that I feel cheated by AT&T’s billing system because I never signed up for PlayPhone’s service, and that I put in extra effort to cancel their service but I still got put back to square one. The guy on the phone was very apologetic, and it sounded like he knew what I was talking about. He helped me cancel the PlayPhone service again, and he told me that I would get refunds from the months that PlayPhone charged me since the day I canceled the service.
I just checked my AT&T online statement and they did give me the refund in the form of credit/discount to my current bill. However, the PlayPhone service is still there…
I will for sure cancel my phone account with AT&T once my contract is up so I can have a clean start.
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This same thing is happening to me…but with T-mobile. Every months I get a bill that says I’m being charged $9.99 a month extra for playphone…I’ve never even heard of that! So now its getting me really angry when I have to keep calling my phone company and complaining to have it removed, but apparently it keeps coming back. What’s the deal? And how do I fix this…
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Hi Brian,
We are very sorry to hear that you’ve had this experience, and we wish to have responded to this blog post earlier, however we are just seeing it for the first time. PlayPhone has competed a lengthy process of clearing up confusion over our subscription pricing plan, and crediting applicable users.
We want to follow-up to ensure you were able to cancel your service subscription. PlayPhone’s services have not included ringtones, wallpaper or similar download offerings for several years. PlayPhone has no control over
data messaging charges of a user’s personal mobile carrier, such as AT&T, T-Mobile etc.
Today, the PlayPhone Social Gaming Network (PSGN) lets you easily download mobile games, connect with your friends and play phone games for free. Most games are free to play and allow the player to purchase in-game items such as coins, chips, and power-ups. We are constantly working to improve our services and provide new experience for our customers.
Please let us know if you have any additional questions.
Thank you kindly – we really appreciate your feedback.
Grace M.
Official PlayPhone Representative
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Hi Grace,
As long as there is a convenient way (like a web form) for people to unsubscribe to PlayPhone once and for all, then it will be all good. People in general hate to pay for something they never knowingly signed up for.
Brian
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From the reports I read so far, it seems that AT&T is well aware of this scam and should be proactive in blocking it from its devices otherwise people will presume that AT&T profits from this scheme. I am also a victim of this scam. Yesterday, June 22, I suddenly found out that I’ve been charged $9.98 supposedly for subscribing to a PlayPhonePlayCredits (PlayPhone 2) when God knows that I don’t play any game online, be it on my computer or my Galaxy phone. That scam company stated that it will renew my unauthorized subscription monthly. I already sent notification to AT&T about it but so far there has been no response. This Grace M. should be ashamed working in a company that steals money from unsuspecting people.
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I had this problem this morning. I went directly to AT&T. They removed the charge from my account and said my conversation would be noted in case of these problems in the future.
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I just discovered that I too was being billed $9.99 monthly for PayPhone. According to my ATT phone rep, ATT does “get a cut of the charge.” However, it is truly PayPhone initiative — they make it all too easy to sign up without realizing it. A SOLUTION: Ask your ATT cellular plan rep to sign you up — free of charge — for the PURCHASE BLOCKER, which will block ATT from being allowed to automatically charge your account for any apps. This will NOT affect your ability to purchase apps from iTunes or the App Store. I also asked the ATT rep to credit all back charges for PayPhone, which he did.
Hope this helps!
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By the way, the customer service number for ATT cellular is 800-331-0500.
I always ask for the rep’s name and his/her employee ID number, and note the date and time of call, as well as the info promised.
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BTW, I meant to write PlayPhone in my posts above … it was definitely a PlayPhone charge. Getting a cup of coffee now LOL…
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PlayPhone scam ….. I never signed up for this. Have had a block on my account since June 11,2013. Att customer service said “he didn’t know how this got through”. Any ATTORNEYS looking for a class action suit? …. it’s a sure winner. Research shows they now have 4 million members! do the math!
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What a scam. I just received a text today alerting me to a PlayPhone subscription renewal. Turns out it was the second charge of $9.98! I definitely never signed up for this “service”. I cancelled the service on the website preventing next month’s charge, added the Purchase Blocker free service, and got a credit for the charges on my next bill…which I’ll watch like a hawk.
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I, too had an issue like this a few moments ago. My husband and I have 2 lines and we each received this text a few minutes ago for the 2nd time. After calling AT&T they somehow only found it on my line, refunded it and added the PURCHASE BLOCKER. This, supposedly is how to get the issue corrected. I also asked if they could send me a letter confirming it has been removed, refunded and corrected, however, they could only send a text. My suggestion to all, there is a class action that suit being pursued. If this has happened to you -Take Action!!
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This just happened to my husband and I with play phone subscription renewal. This has been going on since March and we never signed up for this. How can att allow this fraudulent behavior to continue with Playphone. Someone gets your phone number and automatically signs you up without your permission and bills your cell phone bill…..There has to be a class action lawsuit against this.
Now they are saying they will only give us two months credit….we are going to the cleaners with them ……
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playphone and grace…this is a scam…and i mean scam……cb
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Scam still going strong as of 12-1-13. I started getting these charges a few months ago and thought I had cancelled and BLOCKED this using AT&T’s site, but it keeps charging. I just got off the phone with AT&T and they sounded unaware of this scam. But the rep said she did cancel it, and refunded me last month’s charge. I also called PlayPhone using the # above and unsubscribed via their archaic phone message service. So we’ll see.
But I’d really like an attorney to put these @ssholes behind bars and give me my outstanding $30.00 back.
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As Barry says, this scam is still going on. This really is not right.
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I just got another notification. I have cancelled it 4 times. This is really making me angry.
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This scam is STILL happening as of 11/25/14. Small $9.99 charges started appearing on my mobile bill about three months ago and I didn’t really take notice. I’m usually more on top of these kinds of things but not this time. I just caught up with it today when reviewing my statement on Sprint’s website. I immediately called their Customer Service Department (888) 211-4727 and in about 15 minutes they were able to cancel the PlayPhone “service”, credit me back only 2 months worth (~$20.00) and also put a 3rd Party Block on my number. This is the first time I’ve ever had any kind of issue like this and I think it’s absolutely ridiculous that a company would be so unscrupulous.
It sure would be nice to see a Class Action Lawsuit as I, like other have stated here, didn’t seek out or approve this additional service and charge.
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I am getting the same thing with Sprint. My charge is only 9.99, but still, I don’t want and didn’t subscribe to it! It’s not the phone company’s fault. It’s Playphone! I’ve never even heard of it, and now I’m getting charged. Sprint refunded my money for the previous months, so we’ll see what happens. I’ve unsubscribed…or so I think I have!
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Sprint put the block on my account but that didn’t stop Playphone from charging me a second time. Didn’t realize I had to “unsubscribe” to something I never subscribed to! Thanks Sprint!
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PLEASE HELP ME!!!
This company has been charging me since April 2015 for $12 each month. I have never heard of Playphone subscription before. I have tried to call & send emails but no one has contracted me. Please get back to me
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Still going on 10/9/15…I’ve been charged for 2 months even though Sprint put a block on my phone!
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Merry Christmas, seems these people are still at it. Been dinging me $9.99 monthly since October. I’ve found out about this tonight when I went to pay my bill and wondered why it was more than it should be.
I looked through bills, says original 9.99 charge was for a game called “Fruit Ninja.”, I had to look it up on Google Play to find out what it was. I’ve never downloaded it, played it. Nov charged $9.99 for 3000 credits. Dec charged $9.99 for 3000 credits.
Hopefully as Sprint is aware of these issues, according to earlier posts, it won’t be hard to have this month’s charge removed and the previous month’s charges credited.
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okay, so i to have the same story, but mine has been going on for way to long and am with sprint, this is a SCAM and to l only get back a credit of two months worth is bull s***
if you receive any test on your phone that you do not know, then text back STOP. the amount of money they have “stolen” from all of us is enough to ask for a class action lawsuit.
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I have just found this on my bill, was refunded 3 months and I think we should get a lawyer. Fraudulent 3rd party charges should be not only caught by our service providers but how/why should they get away with this. These scammers are making bank !
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So I guess they switched from ATT to Sprint. I’ve been charged on the month of August of 2016 $9.99 from the same party . I called Sprint where I requested to be unsubscribed and asked for a refund back. No charges for the month of September, and now in October it charged me again. I just talked to another Sprint representative. She says it shows I unsubscribed in August and subscribed back in October. I don’t know how is it possible , but this time the representative unsubscribed me again and did other changes to the account. She said beginning today, if I like to subscribe to any type of games it won’t go towards the Sprint account, but it will ask me for the entire personal and card information. This way I will know if I willingly subscribe to anything. Hope it works.
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