Betamax VoIP accused of fraud
MyVoIPProvider.com has accused VoIP service provider BetaMax VoIP of credit card fraud. They allege that BetaMax improperly charges small amounts of money to credit cards of members, and that because the amounts are small most companies do nothing about it. BetaMax offers services under the names:
www.voipbuster.com, www.sipdiscount.com, www.voipcheap.com, www.voipcheap.co.uk, www.netappel.fr, www.sparvoip.de, www.voipstunt.com, www.internetcalls.com, www.voipdiscount.com, www.poivy.com, www.webcalldirect.com, www.freecall.com, www.nonoh.net, www.voipraider.com, www.justvoip.com, www.voipwise.com, www.budgetsip.com, www.smslisto.com, www.12voip.com, www.lowratevoip.com, www.smsdiscount.com, www.voicetrading.com, www.voipbusterpro.com
This is a pretty serious charge. I have to say that I've purchase from VoIPCheap before. It's true that they ask for a credit card number up front, but I've not encountered the behavior described. In any case, if you're a regular user of their services, you might want to check your credit card statements.
January 23rd, 2008 at 9:26 am
From what I hear from users their game to be different. They will offer very low prices on a specific destination and free minutes. But, you have to deposit money. Then after a short while they change the price. Now you already have 10 dollars in their account, so you are stuck.
January 23rd, 2008 at 12:41 pm
So the Betamax nightmares finally come true? That reminds me of the apprehension I voiced in September:
Markus Göbel’s Tech News Comments: WTF is Betamax (VoIP)?
http://www.goebel.net/technews/2007/09/wtf-is-betamax-voip.html
I still remember the time when they introduced Voipbuster in Germany. They gave us the calls for free, but wanted our bank account data. You had to send them one Euro from your bank account to start to make unlimited calls. This seemed suspicious and many people feared some kind of phishing or another big scam.
But until now Betamax turned out to be a reliable company for me.
January 23rd, 2008 at 8:09 pm
Not only is Betamax fraudulently charging their CUSTOMERS credit cards, they have now found a way to charge innocent victims using stolen credit/debit card numbers. See ripoffreports.com
January 23rd, 2008 at 10:11 pm
Topped up 25euros, was charged VAT of 4euros twice. no refund, no contact, no thing… hope they get what was coming to them. their old forums were littered with unhappy customers
January 26th, 2008 at 11:00 am
I have been using Betamax companies for VOIP service since April 2005. I signed up in a hotel room in Paris (free Internet) and was making free calls to the UK within seconds. I have only paid with PayPal and MoneyBookers. Call quality has generally been excellent. Reliability has improved over the years – now better than a switched circuit. It is rare to get an uncompleted call or poor line quality on a cal.
If you are just looking for free calling, you will get upset when they change their conditions. However, if you are paying for some calls and getting others for free (as I am), the Betamax system, with a couple of accounts, works very well. The biggest “problem” with Betamax (for US users) has been payment in Euros and the rise in the Euro/Dollar exchange rate. And if you only top up with the minimum Euro 10, your potential losses are very limited, compared with the savings you are getting.
Betamax is regularly slagged on various forums; as with all technology “your mileage may very”. They are still in business, unlike a number of other VOIP companies. My experience has been very positive. I willl continue to use them until the experience changes.
January 28th, 2008 at 6:37 am
I have been using Betamax – VoIPBuster and VoIPBuster Pro – since Jan 2007 and have had nothing but positive experience: easy to install, easy to use, cheap calls, no “double billing”.
Call quality is USUALLY good but, when it’s not, I just hang up and redial a few seconds later.
I have recommended to a coupel ofcolleagues and they, too, have had only positive experiences
January 29th, 2008 at 5:22 am
There is a very interesting discussion about the same topic in Voxalot’s forum:
http://forum.voxalot.com/voip-news/2768-betamax-accused-fraud.html
There are many Betamax clients among Voxalot’s users. But so far nobody complained. Maybe it’s all a misunderstanding as “satphoneguy” points out?
January 29th, 2008 at 12:41 pm
One if the ripoffreports authors claims that several items have been charged to their credit card, from several countries
They’ve obviously been victim of stolen ID and credit card details. Why blame one of the companies that the fraudster used it with?
There have occasionally been posts in the Voipbuster forum from disgruntled would-be abusers of the Betamax fair-use policy, with multiple accounts at the same IP address, perhaps callshop proprietors, who have threatened to blackmail the company by publishing complaints on the internet
In this context, the MyVoipProvider article seems based on rumour, not investigation
January 30th, 2008 at 10:23 am
This company Betamax GmbH & Co.KG, or someone diverting funds to this company, today hacked into my Paypal account and took nearly $2000 Australian dollars from my bank account through Paypal (1000 Euros), there’s an Ebay thread on this topic also -
http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=1000614952&tstart=0&mod=1201224528450
January 31st, 2008 at 6:10 am
Betamax is A TOTAL FRAUD COMPANY.. SINCE i deposited money and suddenly i am not able to make calls.. and also refund of my money..
ITS A 100% fraud company….
February 9th, 2008 at 11:35 am
I cant say really anything about satisfied customers, but BETAMAX has discovered a new innovative way of fraudulent with its customers. After charging the account, it allows few calls to be made, then suddenly stops services with an error message (The other party ended the call…). I am not the only victim, there are thousands around the globe. Somebody even tried to reach their allegedly head office at Cologne, it’s not there! People are getting organized to file fraud case against the company. If any of you from this Fraud Cheat & Co. (FCC), better pull up your socks before you are in serious trouble.
February 10th, 2008 at 10:16 am
I have 3 accounts with Betamax, i use voipstunt voipcheap and lowrate voip but, the latest trick this fraud compay is doing they have blocked so many account and i have sent more than 30 emails and didnt got any response i got so mad that i told them im gona go to germany and find them their response was : were waiting for you. Funny thogh the dont give a damn for costumers I wouldnt recomned anyone to buy anymore credit i used to introduce more than 100 friends to betamax products but for now BETAMAX IS A FRAUD AVOID.
February 14th, 2008 at 9:32 am
I can’t believe this. I have an account with nonoh and after topping up my account with 10euros, it has suddenly been blocked. I’ve sent them numerous emails, but no response. I still have 7 euros left in the account. This is absolute fraud!
February 20th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
I have the same problem. I’ve topped up by 10euro and they have blocked my account. I have ‘The other party ended the cal’ unknown error 33!!!l
February 23rd, 2008 at 10:33 am
Hello All,
we are students & living in different cities in germany we’ve problem with this Fraud BETAMAX Company for the last 2 years our account were blocked without any reason our account having enough money to call. We have already contacted 1000 times via email, messages, telephones personally visit but no one gives us a positive & reasonable answer even the office address of Betamax which is showing on different Voip serivices like (lowratevoip, voipwise, Nonoh, internetcalls, voipstunt, voipbuster etc..) is wrong. so you all be carefull to buy a credit from this Fraud company Betamax. We are putting a case against BEtamax so if someone of you has already infected by this company then please contact to the lawyer or whatever you can do. We have here a office name Verbracuher Zentrale we went there with our all bills and calls list balnces they gave us a positive responce but they are also waiting for more complaints so please do whatever you can. thanks
bye
Students living in NRW Germany.
February 24th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
you guys are absolutely correct. We are students here in Sweden. Many times our accounts at voipwise, lowrate, voipraider are blocked even with credit of few (round about 10) euros or US dollars. Each time dialing any number, the stupid message of “The other party ended the call due to unknown error” appears.
I strongly recommend that there should be some action against them at any level.
bye
students in sweden
February 24th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
we are also students here in italy they have also fraud of us we make a lot accounts of bitmax companies but now they have blocked every thing please let do some thing
February 24th, 2008 at 9:49 pm
I have the same problem. I’ve topped up by 10euro and they have blocked my account. I have ‘The other party ended the cal’ unknown error 33!!!l
February 24th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Nonoh.net is a complete fraud! It allows people to make free calls showing you how good the phone voice quality is. Once you decide to purchase their 10 euro (plus 0.50 which is not mentioned before hand), they start to block your calls and charge money for FREE destinations! I heard Germans are good at engineering, but they have shown the other ugly side of them!!!
If other Germans vising this forum are offended by my above comments, then do something about your BETAMAX and ask your government to close it down before it gives you more bad publicity.
February 25th, 2008 at 9:13 am
Never heard of them until I got my credit card bill this morning…
February 26th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
I know four people around me , who are cheated with this company, we all have 10 Euro. in our account but the stupid messiage , the other party ended the call , appear on each trial , we are waiting disperately what this guys may do on our bank account as they already have enough information about us.
Let we work together to bring this compnay to court if it is possible to locate them there where about.
February 26th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
I noticed a strange charge on my bank statement; it was from Betamax, they have done it twice this month it seems. Tomorrow I am going to my bank and start a complaint process. Seems they got my info from voipcheap, what scum.
February 29th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
I never heard of them either until I saw the charge this morning. I can’t believe they’re getting away with this! I’ve never once used ANY VoIP service in my life, so there’s no chance that I’ve used any of their sister companies. I’ll try disputing the charge with my credit card company, but someone needs to do something about this company, what are they a group of slimeballs running this out of their parents basement??
February 29th, 2008 at 5:59 pm
Just as Jeremy said, I had never heard of them until checking my card statements. Their website hasn’t been updated since 2005 so emailing them was a waste of time. I had to close my card and get a new one. What a hassle. And they still get the money. This internet and criminals sure get along good and most get away with it.
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:43 am
UPDATE: I recieved an email from Betamax asking for a copy of my bank statement. They must have training on how to get information and use it for illegally collecting money. I told them if they had the resources to take my money, they had them to put it back. I am awaiting a response.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:01 pm
They claim, by the way, that they are the victims of fraud themselves. Please read this: http://saunderslog.com/2008/02/04/betamax-victims-of-a-fraud-themselves/
It may be that it’s someone spoofing betamax who is stealing your money.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:53 pm
Ive been using voipstunt since 2005, n from 2007 till now voipwise. today in the morning i got to know that my acount has ben blocked, i guess i m the luky one coz i had only 90 cents left.
May 3rd, 2008 at 12:08 pm
BETAMAX is responsible for ALL, THEY CANT MAKE EXCUSES AFTER TAKING MONEY FROM PEOPLE — why — they have blocked so many account.
OVERALL, BETAMAX ITSELF IS FAUNDANT COMPANY IF THEY CANT PROVIDE SECURITY TO ITS CUSTOMERS THEY MUST SHUT THEIR SERVICES. or ITS time to take legal action against them. Join hands and make a combine LAW SUIT against this company.
People if different countries join hands and gather people to make complain, we can make law suit in germany or france where ever they are in!!!
Let us BLOCK BETAMAX!!!
May 4th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
My wife uses voipcheap.com services.
From the beginning everything looked OK, but then
nobody knows how they calculate those “FREE” minutes.
My wife never used announced 300 minutes. And all the time after couple days they start charging and never reply on e-mails.
Does this fraise from their web-site (* Max 300 minutes per week of free calls, measured over the last 7 days and per unique IP address.) sounds tricky? Seems like they count always for last 7 days, which is not really per week.
Plus we found out that even when it says FREE call, your money on account went down.
We are moving from them.
May 6th, 2008 at 6:22 am
This company called betamax is not reliable. i have 4 accounts in all with them with about 30euro in all. all my account were blocked and effort to rectify it from them proof abortive. please i will be glad if there can be any legal pursuit on this fraud case.
May 14th, 2008 at 10:30 am
Voive Trading is A TOTAL FRAUD COMPANY.. i deposited $1600 and i am not able to make calls from my softswitch.. and did not refund of my money..
Voip Wholesaler
May 14th, 2008 at 10:33 am
Here is there new email
helpdesk@voicetrading.com
- Voip Wholesaler
May 15th, 2008 at 3:38 am
Who is Betamax anyways? It sounds to me like another fake company like all the other names. Besides aren’t companies supposed to be registered to a person?
July 10th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Betamax is abosolutely a cheating company. They blocked many.
I think the best way is that all of us ask our bank to give warning of the credit fraud by Betamax, and put the company in the bank’s black list. If all of us do this, the bank will take some measures when doing business with this company
July 15th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
Any complaints should go straight here
Marc Sanders
sales sheriff at VoiceTrading / Betamax GmbH
Cologne Area, Germany
http://www.linkedin.com/pub/6/3a2/b88
Cheers
July 15th, 2008 at 12:41 pm
Before Betamax Marc Sanders worked at Microsoft
http://center.spoke.com/info/pkSzHa/MarcSanders
July 31st, 2008 at 7:20 am
How to close a betamax account?? I’ve searched information about how to do it and can’t find the way to close my account with them. They’ve been recently excluding more and more countries from free destinations and it doesn’t pay off anymore to use their services. Thanks for help in advance.
September 4th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
I recently ran across a $15+ charge on my VISA debit card, attributed to this BetaMax company. They also charged 46 cents worth of international money changing fees. I’ve never used BetaMax or VoIP, and can’t imagine how someone got ahold of my card number. I filed a dispute with my bank, Wells Fargo, who is discontinuing(!) my card and issuing a new one. Are we having fun yet?
September 26th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Well for me everything with this company has been great, good VOIP quality, low rates, no full of bullshit as skype, I would recommend betamax and subsidiaries to all, long life betamax.
PS: from happy custumer not reseller or nothing a simple customer, a fair one : )
October 6th, 2008 at 7:50 am
I have been using quite a lot of the services provided from Betamax since 2005, never had a single problem, I have paid by credit card, paypal, moneybookers, the lot. Not a single fraudulent payment. Maybe people that complain should check what they are doing wrong, accounts are blocked for a reason, and technical problems are most commonly because of users’ lack of knowledge or sheer stupidity. And for the people that got charged on their credit cards – GET REAL! It is YOU that had given your credit card details somewhere not secure, it’s YOUR fault that a fraudster has got your details, it is not Betamax’s fault that all kind of people buy from them!
October 6th, 2008 at 9:19 am
erm..
i’ve using betamax for 2 years..
U must not buy credit using credit card..just buy from reseller
October 12th, 2008 at 9:39 pm
i used beta max 3 service lowrate smslisto and poivy since feb 2007
and every thing is ok voice quality is excelent no chaeating @ all .
i didnt refund by a credit card or a bank transfer i refund by a voucher or a reseller and nothing qrong till now :)
happy customer :)
October 29th, 2008 at 7:43 am
2008/08/24 y 2008/09/06 usaron mi tarjeta de credito sin mi autorisacion, yo e comprado tiempo en justvoip en la cual use mi tarjeta de credito, pero siguen usando otras personas mi credic car podrian decirme o especificar kien ta usando mi tarjeta.
kedo en espera de una respuesta
atte.
flor
October 29th, 2008 at 8:06 am
I use undue of my credit card, I, buy time in justvoiop with my credit card, but they persist to me arriving discounts on behalf of betamax voip they can inform my credit which you not accomplish a purchase in where I can complain for the infringement of my credit card
November 17th, 2008 at 11:10 am
My credit card statement had a $65 charge from “Betamax Voip Credit Cologne De.” Obvious fraud, seeing as how I don’t do business with them (or in Europe) or use any VoIP services. If you see this, cancel your card, and report them! If you don’t cancel, they will repeatedly charge your card…
November 25th, 2008 at 6:05 am
I was a Gold resellerof betamax since 2007, and all of sudden they blocked my account with all my money (1119 Euro). I can not make any phone call, i can not transer credit to anyone. i send several emails to customer service but no responce. in simple words betamax is fraud..
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:25 pm
I got charged with two small amounts, plus the foreign trans charges. I caled my credit card company, and have since had the charges removed. NOW I find out my name, address and phone number has been listed as a complaint resource. I’ve had a call from somebody in a foreign country and a call from someone in PA.
The lady in PA was very undestanding and we had a nice conversation. I’ve yet been able to locate the right web site that lists my personal information.
So if anyone gets my personal information as someone to lodge a complaint, please be assured I have been a victim of this scam. Dealing with the financial charges, I am now trying to deal with my personal information being used.
If anyone out there can assist me, I will be greatful.
December 4th, 2008 at 10:47 am
For some time I was a happy user, but ever since they force their Chinese clients to go through shady resellers (although they insist they don’t use those), it is a mess. Their customer services stinks like hell, rude, evasive and outright a$%holes. Suing them won’t do the job. They are registered in Germany and legal procedures there are complicated and time consuming. It’s far better to boycott betamax all together and set up a warning system through community sites like Facebook to warn people about these business practises and frau Karin Nab, if she exists at all. It doesn’t work for clients to sue her, it won’t work for her to sue all the clients who complained. Where are the competitors of Betamax? Don’t they want to clean up their sector before it’s all in ruins?
December 5th, 2008 at 1:31 am
Hi
I am surprised with these negative feedbacks, I am an old client of Betamax and never had problems with them. I think most of the problems mentioned in this website are due to misunderstanding or being careless so the end result is that your credit card info stolen and get charged.
December 5th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
I have used betamax and bought credit from resellers for a year, last month i paid via bank transfer , and still my account balance is 0.00, i didnt got the amount of money i sent
December 8th, 2008 at 12:28 pm
Hi there, I use to call Ukraine, and as many of us I have a few accounts – justvoip, poivy and 12voip. I put these accounts in order in which I switched from one to another, and the reason was that the other was offering better price. These guys use to give a good rate at the beginning but then the price goes up. This is the only bad experience with them, and so far there were no suspitious charges or anything else. I use paypal to pay them and I find it the safer way. They are still the best choice for me, other companies charge more
December 13th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
I sent money via PayPal to a reseller, DeepReach Inc. (http://www.mmambou.com/deepreach/en/default.htm) and didn’t receive credit/voucher. Their answer to my inquiries: “Hi, This is apperently a fraudulent payment, because (my name here) is not known at that adress.
Thanks”
I immediately filed a complaint with PayPal.
Does anybody have a working email address for VoipBuster/Betamax? Thanks.
December 16th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Well I’m having a kind of same problem. I’m using Betamax since mid of last year and use to pay credit by PAYPAL;nevertheless after top up the credits and upon using calls the money is depleted far more quickly than it’s stipulated rates for a certain destination. Moreover, SMS are also charge by 0.03cent/sms but interestingly in their advertisement they say SMS are free but as usuall a very tiny text in the terms and conditions say something about FAIR use policy. What the hell, if your network is incapable to bear load then what are you doing in the market. Authorities must do something about this FAKE Company. I’m really mad as I have spend lots of money in making calls from this Company. Please do let me know where I can complain about them
December 16th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
THIS IS THE SO CALLED CONTACT ADDRESS OF BETAMAX FOUND AT.
http://www.webdirect.com
===============================================
About us.
WebCallDirect is a service from
Betamax GmbH & Co KG
Im Mediapark 8
50670 Köln
Email: Please use the forms on our contact page
Tel: +49-221-3549565
Fax: +49-221-3549566
Managing director: Karin Nab
Commercial Register of the Local Court: Cologne
Registered under number: HRA 23157
VAT number: DE814570978
Disclaimer: Betamax GmbH & Co KG does not take responsibility, or endorses the content of external hyperlinks on this site.
Webcalldirect: Check the webcalldirect.com website for conditions and prices.
===============================================
January 14th, 2009 at 4:13 am
these bad mother fuckers,
these bad mother fuckers
these bad mother fuckers
these bad mother fuckers
these bad mother fuckers
they just made 2 freakin’ transactions using my paypal account, one to rapidshare and they got themselves premium account for a year (54.99 EUR) , and once paypal recognized this payment was not made from north america, put it on hold and then they made another payment (60.21 EUR) to their stupid website http://www.12voip.com
and you guys now say their service is cheap? I wonder why????? CUZ THER FUCKIN’ STEAL IT FROM PEOPLE LIKE US.
January 20th, 2009 at 7:14 pm
Does anybody know how i Can close my account with nonoh, dialnow, lowratevoip and voipbuster.
I sent some emails to Betamax to close my account but they have not answered after almost ! year.
January 23rd, 2009 at 2:21 pm
whoever wants proof that betamax ARE REALLY CROOKS, CRIMINALS, FRAUDULENT (call it however you want) i can proof that it is betamax company which does ilegal debits on your credit card! there is no such thing like betamax being themselves crooked….. bullshit!
on my netapple.fr account which i had with them i did maybe buy 4 x credit (4 x € 10) but over the same period appeared about 8 debits signed betamax…… now tell me what that is? fraud or not????!!!!!!
and of course, even i called them – yes, their office phone number exists and works – but obviously i never got any reply or refunding!
so all these who were writing here, they have positive experience since years, i must say frankly speaking: I DO NOT BELIEVE YOU. it is very possible that you simply didn’t check it that you have been tricked out on your credit card!
if you want to see proof, i have all the copies of netappel.fr account extract where my official purchases appear and my bank account extracts!
just e-mail: maravilha00@hotmail.com
February 5th, 2009 at 6:41 pm
I complained various times to Betamex about Justvoip and Poivy but never received a reply. This company names all belong to this Betamax . They said I can fone Brasil 300 minutes per week but after I fone couple of minutes they change to the sistem of paying saying that I exceeded the fair time .This is fraud and there is nobody to reply or correct the problem. They put this sistems on the market very cheap to figth their opositions but offer a rubish service . I am very fustrated with this bad service and if they correct it I will writght here the result.
Just e-mail; almaidamiu@hotmail.com
March 20th, 2009 at 3:14 am
Betamax have been charging my credit card for large amounts and I have never used them before!!! Seems they are very popular for fraudulent use on credit cards!! Congratultions on ruining peoples lives when people are struggling anyway.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:05 am
I too am a victim of the BETAMAX VOIP CREDICOLOGNE fraud charges to my bank account. It immediately followed the purchase of sipphone by vnet for my iphone.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
I have the same problems with Voip buster.
After using this system for a few months they blocked me with an error message and today I realized (lately I agree with this) that every two months Betamax was taking 12.5 € out of my credit card.
I send them immediately a mail and I’ll go monday to the Belgian police in order to deposit a complain against them.
Betamax is a fraud company – it’s sure !
March 25th, 2009 at 1:31 am
I do not understand, how such criminals continue to cheat peoples?
104 Euro on my account and stupid message – The other party ended the cal’ unknown error 33
March 25th, 2009 at 10:17 am
I’m in the U.S. and I have a charge from these people on my card. I recieved a call from a fraud protection agency, so most of the charges were blocked.
It’s amazing what some people/companies come up with.
March 30th, 2009 at 10:13 am
I was scammed by this company. I saw a debit against my checking account that I did not authorize nor recognize. There also was a currency conversion fee so the bank could change USD to DM. I have no idea how these people got access to my checking account, but clearly they are robbers and thieves. Fortunately, my bank reversed the charges.
March 31st, 2009 at 7:18 am
I have read about many issues on http://forum.voipbuster.com
But how do users posting here find this website right here based on a credit card charge?
April 4th, 2009 at 11:20 pm
If you have never used any of this betamax clones, it is for SURE that your credit card data have been compromised because of a virus or spyware (conficker anyone?…)
The hackers register keyboard input and sell the data around the globe, so a guy in pakistan is actually using your credit card and they use betamax to power their call-centers… why? because betamax does not actually check if the name of the credit card maches the number. And Betamax have no staff to prosecute this kind of fraud, it just blocks the accounts as soon as they realize that it’s a fraud, and that could take like forever.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:19 am
Betamax very well checks the creditcard data. To begin with they need you to confirm your telephone number before any transaction can take place. So it is very unlikely they can resort to these kind of excuses.
It is possible though that their system was compromised by hackers that stole creditcard data and are now pulling money with the same notice as betamax uses. This would explain why users never using any betamax service also complain.
Fact remains they always scammed on the borderline, f.i. with their free sms system thats free until they want to charge you. But now and thats new, they start blocking accounts regardless the amount of money in them. So it seems they are either buffering their losses this way or something else is pretty much wrong here and they don’t want to admit.
There has alway been a huge level of secrecy from betamax side IMHO due to the fact that they run their buisness almost without any personel. This would also account for their systems being compromised and the lack of resolving current issues.
So I think that Betamax lost control over their systems and everybody is well advised to steer clear and take the step to the more expensive skype service instead.
April 18th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
I was also a victim to this, i dont even know who they are or how they got my info but they made 2 small charges $20.50 and $.62 and I immediately called my Bank and they credited me and cancelled my card. i dont even know who they are!
April 26th, 2009 at 2:58 am
Hi everybody, i am really surprised to hear so much offensive comments against Betamax. I am using thier service in various forms like voipbuster,voipraider,lowratevoip, voipcheap etc since 2002. Till today they had never cheated or took extra money from my account. I had never even faced any problems like what you all had mentioned. I had recommended the voip service from betamax to many of my friends and all are using the same for years together and sofar no one had any complaints except that sometimes the voice clarity is not clear but this could arise in any of the telephone service as well, but with the rest of handling money etc we are all very well satisfied. So, i really wonder looking into this blog.
April 27th, 2009 at 4:42 pm
Hi everyone,
I’ve been a business user of betamax products for over a year, without major problems, until the begining of this month.
I had just upped my poivy account to ~150 Eur and realized that my calls were not going trough poivy, but rather to voipcheap, the fallback account.
Because of that, as the voipcheap account got suddenly drained, I filled that up while trying to get some feedback (via emails) for what happened to poivy.
Then, today, voipcheap also stoped working, resulting in more than 200 Eur in some limbo (luckily, it was bank transfers, not credit cards).
I can’t get any response from betamax and the telephone directs me to email via a recorded message.
This is very bad for us, as a small company, but it is hugely bad for voip comunity, as once more, seems that voip providers are doomed to finish as rapidly as they start.
beware!
Antonio
(Portugal)
May 5th, 2009 at 9:26 am
Yesterday I found this mysterious $21.60 (US) charge on my credit card from “Betamax VOIP Credit”. I have never done business with them nor had I heard of them before. I DO use VOIP, but it is with Skype (I pay for unlimited US calling as well as a phone number). And, the Skype charges clearly appear separately on my card, properly labeled.
They stole my credit card info and charged it. The CC company dropped the charge.
What’s interesting here is that ever 2-3 months, someone is able to electronically steal my CC number and use it for various charges (not Betamax until now). I then have to get it canceled and start using another card. It is always the card that I have the automated Skype payments set up with that gets stolen. I suspect someone working for Skype may be stealing and supplying numbers to Betamax and other companies (for a fee), although I cannot prove it. (I’m not blaming Skype itself, just a rogue employee.)
May 8th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
HI to any feedbacks. I see that you have been a victim of hackers, I am an computer engineering and I am searching for good iternacional rate and I anded here to this site and I feel that all negative feedback do not understand the principle of BETAMAX, They all conect the BETAMAX with the VOIP venders and saying that those providers are BETAMAX site, It is wrong, BETAMAX is no midlemen of VOIP. They are direct wholesale of VOIP. There are just few wholesalers as this side on world who gives faire price of VOIP. All you are complaining for BETAMAX but I do not see you as buyers to BETAMAX, but I see you as customer of midlemen links as
voipbuster,voipraider,lowratevoip, voipcheap.
ONE THING I WILL TELL YOU, IF YOU CONECT TO ME AND YOUR CALL WILL GO THROUGH BETAMAX AND I WILL FROUD YOU AS YOU COMPLAIN, NOW LET ME KNOW WHAT IS WRONG WITH BETAMAX.
May 13th, 2009 at 3:34 am
I am using Betamax service also I am reseller its good.
But there is one biggest problem with Betamax.
There customer services is very bad.
In my words Betamax have no any customer service also no
Any reseller’s customer services.
Best regards
Abid Maqsood.
May 13th, 2009 at 10:35 am
After getting from me 40 euro they suspend my account, accused me for fraud payment. No answers from feedback services, no possibility to phone to somewhere. Very good buisness, good profit. For them. I would not advice to anybody.
Oleg
May 16th, 2009 at 10:01 am
actually im using betamax services in russia for more than 7 months every thing was ok i used poivy,nonoh lately i started to use action voip and smart voip(2 months ago) as i said before the service with them was very good in payments , in voice quality untill yesterday i discovered that my account in smartvoip was blocked,i used it 1 hour before they did so in the afternoon im always using ukash to pay for them that mean they have no chance to say that the payment was fraudery i have about 100 euro in the account i sent them email and still waiting.if any one has an idea for what to do please contact me to long-dagger@hotmail.com thnks
jafar
May 17th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
nonoh.net has stop servicing my account with 8euro on it. Cannot remember if I’ve entered my CC info on their site? Anyway I’ve opened a dispute on paypal to return my money. Loooking for a new cheap VOIP provider. Could somebody recommend me one??
May 18th, 2009 at 7:42 am
to my surprise today i found that betamax reactivated my account!! i can now honestly say that they re a very good company and they re really concerned about their clients.thanks betamax for ur care
May 19th, 2009 at 4:00 am
Nonoh is a scam. After 1.5h doesnt work anymore and they started charging me for free destinations. I called my bank today and they told me to write them an email and print that and bring to the bank so they will take my money back.
Betamax is scam, people stay away from that!!
May 20th, 2009 at 3:55 am
if anyone interested i can recharge whatever amount of ukash voucher
May 25th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
I first subscribed to voipcheap several years ago and was generally pleased with the service. Lately I’ve been checking my bills and found that many calls have been tagged as “FUP Exceeded”. Checking the Fair Usage Policy I have failled to find where I have exceeded any Fair Usage Policy and think the company is using this to charge at a higher rate. I have written about this and await a reply.
Last year I subsribed to the calls4text service, never got it to work, never got a decent reply from support and it appears that I have lost my £10 forever (plus VAT). Today the website seems to have disappeared. I hope to be included in a future class action lawsuit againts betamax. This is not the way companies do business.
May 27th, 2009 at 8:57 am
I regret not checking these forums earlier – I’ve lost 12.50 euros, which has been debited from my account, but Betamax (www.voipcheap.com) claim the “payment failed”, and since have been uncontactable.
Clearly this is a FRAUDULENT company taking innocent users for a ride – THIEVES is the only way to describe how they operate.
What can we do about it? Perhaps we can try to find out the contact details of the person running it – Karin Nab – and post them all over the web, to start off with.
DON’T BECOME BETAMAX’S NEXT VICTIM!!!!!!!!!!
May 29th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
My wife and I have used the software from this company for a while to make calls to Romania. We used a credit card to make payments up till this incident, where they no longer allowed credit card payment, and required a wire transfer to be made. They promised me through their online “feedback” link that once I made a wire transfer, I would then be provided with the ability to use credit card. Well.. I setup a new bank account with Chase (formerly Washington Mutual), just because they allow free wire transfers, so I wouldn’t be charged $25 for a $10.50 wire transfer. After making the transfer on 5/13/09 (wire went on 5/14/09), a week later I asked why the funds did not show up in my account. Their response was that “this was credited to one of your other accounts” .. I told them that the number they provided to me so that it would be credited to my account properly was sent with the wire transfer in the “beneficiary information” field, since I had noplace else to put it. They have demanded proof of the wire transfer .. which I provided to them with a couple PDFs that I scanned from my bank, including the bank statement.. After providing them with proof, they no longer respond to my feedback comments, or emails.. (I sent an email to the address which I got from networksolutions.com). I called the phone number 4922155405564, which was also from networksolutions.com, and the person answering (named Kerstin), said that she is only a “post office” and does not answer any questions, and doesn’t even work for the company (Betamax). So it appears that they have taken my money and do not plan to provide the service they advertise for it.
I notice they use a web feedback system so that they can delete their responses for when they are pursued legally. I’ve sent the complaint here to http://www.ic3.gov where I recommend any U.S. citizens who have been defrauded by them should go to add their own complaint.
June 5th, 2009 at 6:31 am
[...] | Alec Saunders SquawkBox Betamax is abosolutely a cheating company . The rest is here: Betamax VoIP accused of fraud | Alec Saunders SquawkBox This entry is filed under Warnings for Frauds. You can follow any responses to this entry through [...]
June 21st, 2009 at 10:04 am
Hi All,
I have purchase 5 different accounts from Betamax, they suddenly stop service without any notice. i mean every time we want to make a call its shown error code “Call Ended ( The other party ended the call due to unknown reason)” . Any number in the world we cant make a call out.
I believe, some how Betamax system block our office IP as we use 5 different accounts. I have contact them couple of time by fax and by “customer feedback form” Since April 2009; But i haven’t received any feedback from them. Seems like they don’t have any customer service or technical support service. So, anyone can assist me how i could re-activate my accounts OR can anyone provide me Betamax’s real phone number or email ID. Thank you.
Best Rgds
Sam
reach2bc@yahoo.co.uk
June 24th, 2009 at 9:20 am
I have been using betamax for over a year now and yes they have changed their rates some times increased and sometimes decreased it as well to lower what i paid at the time i signed up. Quality is generally very good and I don’t have any complaints regarding the service they provide.