U.S. consumer bureau sues Sprint over phone bill ‘cramming’
Source: Reuters
A U.S. consumer watchdog agency on Wednesday filed a lawsuit against wireless carrier Sprint Corp over unauthorized charges on customers cellphone bill, a practice known as cramming.
In a third cramming-related government enforcement action this year, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau alleges that from 2004 to December 2013, Sprint billed its customers tens of millions of dollars in unauthorized third-party charges while keeping up to 40 per cent of the revenue.
The Federal Communications Commission is also weighing a $105-million fine against Sprint for charging its customers for services that they had never requested.
The case against Sprint marks the first joint public action by the FCC and the CFPB.
Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-business/us-business/us-consumer-bureau-sues-sprint-over-phone-bill-cramming/article22118531/?cmpid=rss1
Good. I hate sprint.
We used sprint for about six months (in Canada). During that time they altered the terms of their "unlimited long distance calling" plan three times.
ETA comment.
olddots
(10,237 posts)They got us where they want us and we don't even see it .
Fred Sanders
(23,946 posts)is yet another ignored major accomplishment.
fasttense
(17,301 posts)and their service continued to go down hill.
I used Sprint for years until I found my bill was going up and up and yet there was no reason for the continuing increases. I had unlimited long distance and yet I was charged $5 and $6 for each long distance call.
I found another carrier and though I now get REAL unlimited long distance, their charges are mysteriously going up and up too.
It's all one big scam, thanks to capitalism.
Veilex
(1,555 posts)I could tell you some real horror stories... like the fact that Sprint had (has?) federal contracts which require all customer service to be done within the US. However, sprint had (has?) customer service centers up in Canada that regularly and illegally serviced those government contracts. Add to that, issues where phones did not disconnect from a tower because the software in a flip phone would not disconnect the phone when closed, or the "end call" option was not explicitly pressed, causing in the upwards of 50 thousand dollars in overage fees (which is also virtually impossible as there were not enough chargeable minutes in a pay period to accumulate that much overage in that particular case). Situations where a phone has clearly been cloned and usage is through the roof, again cause tons of overage fees.
So many things that the cell phone industry does to screw over its customers. Up to and including a mandatory clause that essentially stipulates that the company doesn't owe you anything in any situation regardless of what you think you're owed.
Cell phone companies are evil. I know. I used to work for one.
In fact, habitually reversing those evils nearly got me fired more than once.
Glad I don't work there anymore.
onehandle
(51,122 posts)Wait... Won't happen. They literally run the FCC.
tonekat
(1,805 posts)Back when I used them as my cell carrier, I discovered monthly charges for "roadside service". From a phone company?? Besides I had AAA.
I called them on it and the rep said something like; "Oh gosh, how did that get there, we'll remove it right away!" In other words; "Drat, you caught us!".