French Woman Owed Huge Telephone Bill

NPR

Published October 12, 2012 at 7:02 AM EDT

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep. A French woman received a telephone bill and immediately noticed something wrong. The numbers showing how many euros she owed had the decimal point in the wrong spot and an extra 12 zeroes. She owed 11 quadrillion euros. She called the phone company and an operator said, sorry, a computer generated that, can't change it. The company finally relented, which is too bad, because if she'd paid it could've solved the European debt crisis. You're listening to MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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