Have you been crammed? No, we are not referring to the way you feel after a weekend of dining out and then trying to put on a snug pair of jeans. We’re talking about the practice of unauthorized charges on your phone bill.

In addition to providing telephone service, local telephone companies often bill their customers for long distance and other services that are provided by third parties. Cramming happens when any of these companies either accidentally or intentionally send inaccurate billing data to be included on your local telephone bill.

The phony charges may be for website design, voice mail, club memberships, 900 numbers, psychics or other services that were crammed onto your phone bill. Cramming can be hard to detect because such generic terms as “service charge” or “fee” may be used. Often the amounts are small so they don’t seem obvious on your phone bill.