Posted on 02/02/2011 11:08:28 AM PST by Swordmaker
Wireless carrier accused of inflating data transfers, billing for 'phantom' downloads
Computerworld - AT&T has "systematically" overcharged iPhone and iPad owners with capped data plans by inflating the amount of data they download and adding "phantom traffic," a lawsuit claimed last week.
AT&T said it would "vigorously" fight the suit.
The complaint, filed by Patrick Hendricks in federal court in California, claims that a "significant portion" of AT&T's $1.1 billion of wireless revenue gains in the last quarter came from the bogus charges and overbilling.
Hendricks' lawyers asked a judge to grant the lawsuit class-action status; if that happens, the case would be open to millions of iPhone and iPad owners in the U.S.
Citing evidence obtained by a consulting firm hired by Henricks' attorneys, the lawsuit contends that AT&T regularly overstates incoming data by 7% to 14%, and in some cases by as much as 300%.
"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 complaint states.
Hendricks' suit also alleges that AT&T bills for data transfers that never took place. During a 10-day stretch, the same consulting firm found that AT&T billed a new iPhone's account for approximately 2.2MB of data transfers, even though the smartphone had had all push notification and location services disabled, no e-mail account configured, and no active apps.
"This is like a rigged gas pump charging you when you never even pulled your car into the station," the lawsuit states.
(Excerpt) Read more at computerworld.com ...
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I’d be happy if I could just get two bars of signal from ATT in the Denver area...
Having a 3GS, I’m grandfathered in the unlimited data plan, so I’ve never had to worry about this. If I get a 3G iPad, I will.
Although there is one meeting room I go to where there is ethernet but no wi-fi. The iPad does not accept ethernet and At&T does not work there either. So I have to go online with my Verizaon mi-fi running the iPad. That one is unlimited.
If it becomes a class action suit and AT&T is found to have really screwed customers, the only winners will be the lawyers while the people who were screwed get a $5 coupon for their next upgrade.
If it becomes a class action suit and AT&T is found to have really screwed customers, the only winners will be the lawyers while the people who were screwed get a $5 coupon for their next upgrade.
I promise! I only clicked the “Post” button once!
My iPhone couldn’t possibly download any limit as the connection rates are too damned slow.
AT&T provides the double post so they can charge you for for the bandwidth.
I’m not having a problem believing this. Sucks that Cingular got bought by AT&T.
This doesn’t surprise me. It was dumb of AT&T to get rid of the unlimited data plans in the first place. You can’t monitor data usage like you can phone minutes or text. If I have a 200 text message plan, and send 199 texts, I know I can send exactly one more before I get charged. Same thing with minutes. But with data, if I have 200MB a month and I see I’ve used 195MB, what can I do? Will the next web page I go to have a huge image file I don’t know about that will put me over? What about my app that wants to update - is the update 50KB or 10MB? You don’t know until after you’ve used it, and you get the text message telling you you’re being billed for more data. (I wonder if they’d also charge you for the text if you had reached your text limit.)
The only way a limited data plan makes sense is if the cap is proactive - shut off data transfer when you reach your limit, and require a user action (such as a password entry) to accept the overage. Otherwise the 3G connection is disabled until the next billing cycle. Until they can do this, they should figure out what it costs for unlimited data and set the plan at that price.
Dang! You beat me to it...
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