Non-returned device-deceased

First of all we only know what you tell us.  No matter how you upgrade, if you upgraded your phone line before your previous phone was 100% paid off, and was required to be returned as part of the upgrade, you are correctly being charged a non-return charge for your previous phone. Not the new phone.

Go back and check some of your older bills. If you're older bills show that your previous phone was not yet paid off there's your answer

You said new line?  

Are you sure you didn't upgrade a different line, and existing line?  

No it wasn’t an upgrade of any kind just a new line. 

So what happened was the person who had this number before me died. And they didn’t return their phone that they owed money on. And somehow it got applied to my account but at&t fixed it and admitted the mistake. 

Hello @Jhankeeling,

We do see that you have an issue regarding trade in and would like to investigate it further.

The Community Forums are a public support option where other users, and AT&T, will try and assist with high level support needs. This means we won’t be able to look into account specific concerns.  To get the help you need for your unique issue, please review our Contact Us page (https://www.att.com/support/contact-us/), and choose the best option to reach out to us.  You can call, chat, or reach out via social media, and we can review your specific issue and provide you support.  If you feel your issue isn’t account specific, and can be answered generally, please let us know, and we’ll be happy to help.

Thank you,
Jessica, AT&T community specialist.

This was not a trade in issue. I never upgraded or had a phone to trade in.