ConsumerReports.org's February edition provides some tips for consumers buying cell phones for y... Child's cell phone can

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Cell phones for kids are a hot ticket. If you've got a 'tween or teen in the house, you know this all too well. Either the kid's got a cell phone or is begging for his first.

But wrong numbers do happen. As the number of cell-toting kids multiplies, so do related issues. Some unexpected, as my colleague Roxanne Roberts discovered after buying her son, Carter, his first wireless phone for his 13th birthday.

"He's getting around on his own more, and we thought he should have his own phone," says Roberts. Roberts signed up for a Cingular "GoPhone" account -- a pay-in-advance plan that charges 5 cents per text message and 25 cents per call. She set Carter's monthly limit at $10, figuring that should accommodate a teenage newbie's cell-phone habit and teach him about sticking to a budget.

But within an hour after the account was activated, Carter's new phone erupted with rapid-fire beeps and buzzes of a couple dozen incoming text messages -- the latest scores from the NFL and scoring possibilities from the online dating service Match.com. By the end of the day, half of his monthly budget was shot from unwanted texting.

Roberts says she spent an hour on the phone with Cingular customer service trying to find out what was going on. The rep acknowledged that the text messages were coming from subscriptions to online services the previous owner of Carter's cell phone number hadn't canceled.

After the typical go-around consumers often face when calling customer service, Roberts persuaded a supervisor to delete the text charges. But the supervisor said Cingular couldn't terminate "third-party" online services connected to Carter's phone. Her advice: Keep the phone turned off and cancel the subscriptions yourself.

"I can't believe Cingular and other phone companies are giving new owners used numbers that are still subscribed to services," Roberts says. "I find it pretty shocking that they can't block previous text accounts. And I'm especially annoyed that it was somehow my responsibility to fix the problem and beg for charges to be credited back to the account."

The wireless phone industry doesn't exactly publicize it routinely recycles used cell-phone numbers. But with the rapid growth of cell-phone use, phone companies say it's impossible to issue a brand new number to every new customer.

"We just surpassed the 200 million subscriber mark. We're at 203 million," says Joe Farren, director of public affairs at CTIA -- the Wireless Association, a trade group representing wireless phone companies. "Ten years ago, there were 33.7 million."

Inheriting a number used to mean nothing more than receiving occasional wrong-number calls. Now, cell-phone users can subscribe to services charged to their monthly phone bills that upload ring tones, TV broadcasts, movie listings, dating links, NASCAR standings, weather reports, digital music, stock tracking, etc.

"If they have the technology to track exactly when, where and who I call -- and charge me 45 cents a minute when I go over my minutes -- why can't they give my son a clean phone number?" asks Roberts, whose persistence eventually got someone at Cingular to end the subscriptions.

Kaufman says Cingular has taken steps to "terminate subscription services once a number has been taken out of service." Despite Roberts' difficulty getting the problem resolved, Kaufman says those customer service reps were out of line. "Cingular will gladly credit the charges and will assist the customer to terminate the subscription."

"There are plenty of companies that see cell phones in kids' hands as their next cash cow -- and not just the telecommunications companies. It's all of the 800- and 888-number companies and marketers," says Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, a nonprofit consumer group in Portland, Ore., that is leading a campaign urging Congress to enact protections to make cell phones safer for kids.

"There is a whole host of concerns that are raised by giving your kids cell phones ... and the risks probably get bigger as time passes," he says.

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