SALINAS, Calif.- "This nickel and diming tactics...Is something I would expect in my past life as a dope and drug user. I don't expect to get it from the one percent of the one percent so that the stockholders at Sprint can buy caviar and go on luxurious trips around the world; I need the two dollars to pay rent."
Wayne Ross is mad and he's doing something about it! Every penny matters to the man who has turned his life around and now voluteers at the shelter he called home years ago.
So when he got his Sprint cell phone bill this month and noticed an extra two dollar charge that wasn't there before, he called Sprint.
"They pointed out there was this city of Salinas utility tax and I said 'I've never had that before'...They said I needed to get ahold of Salinas to dispute it with them."
So he did. And Salinas' finance department said he wasn't their first call. Salinas does have an ordinance called the Utility Users Taxation on Telephones, but Salinas says its Ultility User Tax only applies to land lines.
The city found out Ross and other Sprint users have been getting the charge on their cell phone bills.
The finance department said today it contacted Sprint and requested the company fix the error and refund the Salinas customers, like Ross, who were already charged.
"Some people say it's only two dollars, well to me it doesn't matter if it's penny, it's the principal," said Ross.
