FELIX Chillemi scrubs and tidies people's homes for a living, but for three weeks the Kewarra Beach businessman thought he was the one being taken to the cleaners after Telstra slapped him with an $18,157 phone bill.

Mr Chillemi, who owns a small cleaning business, said the telco put him through "three weeks of hell" before yesterday contacting him to say the bill had been waived after inquiries from The Weekend Post.
He was dumbfounded to receive a bill on January 14 that was more than 70 times his usual $250 charge after a mystery fee of $17,917 was tacked on for two "secure locker devices".
Weeks of daily phone calls to Telstra to resolve the issue proved fruitless.
"They put me through three weeks of hell and stress," Mr Chillemi said.
"I have been up three or four times a night walking around the house worrying. $18,000 doesn't just grow in the back yard."

 

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