Coming on the heels of Apple’s announcement that AT&T rival Verizon has been added to the short-list of wireless carriers selling iPhones, AT&T Mobility now faces a class action lawsuit for systematically overcharging iPhone and iPad customers for data transactions. The charges are said to be small in each instance, but in the aggregate, amount to millions of dollars in revenue for the wireless carrier, the litigation alleges.
“AT&T’s billing system for iPhone and iPad data transactions is like a rigged gas pump that charges for a full gallon when it pumps only nine-tenths of a gallon into your car’s tank,” the suit alleged. “AT&T’s bills systematically overstate the amount of data used on each data transaction involving an iPhone or iPad account.”
According to the federal class-action lawsuit, an independent consulting firm hired by plaintiff Patrick Hendricks’ counsel conducted a two-month study of AT&T’s data usage billing practices, and discovered the carrier systematically overstated web server traffic by 7% to 14% — and in some cases by more than 300%
As a result, an iPhone user who downloads a 50 KB website will typically be billed for 53.5 KB (a 7% price hike) to as much as 150 KB (a 300% overcharge). The suit also accuses AT&T of billing customers for non-use.
“It gets worse,” Plaintiffs allege. “Not only does AT&T systematically overbill for every data transaction, it also bills for phantom data traffic when there is no actual data usage initiated by the customer.” Plaintiffs’ consulting firm, which purchased an iPhone from an AT&T store, closed all applications, disabled all notifications and services, deactivated the email and left it alone for 10 days.
“During this 10-day period, AT&T billed the test account for 35 data transactions totaling 2,292 KB of usage,” Plaintiffs argue. “This is like the rigged gas pump charging you when you never even pulled your car into the station.”
AT&T spokesman Marty Richter told Consumer Ally the company intends to defend itself “vigorously.”