The Rice University Neologisms Database

to put unauthorized charges on someone’s phone bill The word “cram” traditionally refers to forcing something full or to press tightly. According to the explanation on the phone bill, “cramming” refers to having “charges on your phone bill for products or services that you have not authorized.” Similar to the existing definition, they use “cram” to describe forcing or filling something (your phone bill) full. Thus, the new definition for the word “cram” can be described as a semantic shift, extending the use of the existing word to a new domain, that of recent scams in telephone communication.