Cutting expenses could be as simple as checking your bills

Everybody is looking for ways to cut their expenses, so when Jill Rhine began to look at her phone bill she found a number of ways. One surprised her.

Rhine and her husband have wireless internet on their laptops so they decided to cut their home internet service through AT&T. That would save her $25 a month.

But Rhine noticed another charge she didn't understand, from USBI.

When she called AT&T they told her it was from a third party biller for long distance service. But Rhine already had unlimited long distance service through AT&T. So she called USBI.

They told her she had signed up for the service over the internet in June.

Rhine tried to explain that she already had a long distance contract with AT&T, that there was no way she would have signed up for a duplicate service. When she asked to speak to a supervisor, she was told USBI would stop the billing and investigate the addition of the service.

A spokesperson told us, they simply provide third party billing for a number of companies, but they have a zero tolerance for fraud and if a company had fradulently added the service they would take corrective action, which could include stopping to provide service to that company.