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AT&T Residential Internet Billing Class Action Lawsuit
By Matt O’Donnell
AT&T customers have filed a class action lawsuit against the company to stop its “unlawful practice of systematically overcharging customers for residential Internet service” by promoting plans for $19.95 a month, but then charging them $40 a month for either the entire year or a portion thereof.
“AT&T advertises many promotional plans at reduced rates for residential Internet service and then bills those who sign up for the promotions at the standard higher rates,” claims the AT&T Internet class action lawsuit. “Unfortunately, AT&T has breached its contracts with its customers of AT&T Residential Internet service by failing to live up to the terms offered and accepted.”
The crux of the problem, the class action lawsuit says, stems from AT&T not applying the bill credit within the first two billing cycles and then either not apply the credit at all, thus forcing the consumer to pay the standard rate for the entire duration of the contract, or applying the bill credit for only a portion of the contract duration, thus forcing the consumer to pay the higher standard rate for some of the months.
“As a result, consumers only receive the promotional pricing for 0 to 11 of the first 12 months of service, rather than 12 of the first 12 months, even though they contracted to receive the promotional pricing for 12 of the first 12 months of service,” the class action lawsuit states.
The AT&T Internet plan class action lawsuit is brought on behalf of anyone in the U.S., and a subclass of individuals who live in Illinois, that signed up for a promotional rate plan for residential Internet service with AT&T but were charged the standard rate for all or part of the duration of the promotional rate period between July 26, 2007 and the present. It is seeking economic, monetary, actual, consequential and compensatory damages in addition to other relief for alleged Breach of Contract, Violations of the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act, and Unjust Enrichment.
A copy of the AT&T Residential Internet Class Action Lawsuit can be read here.
The case is Richard Sherman v. AT&T, Inc., Case No. 11CH26265, Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois.
Updated August 3rd, 2011
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79 thoughts onAT&T Residential Internet Billing Class Action Lawsuit
i would love to join because my bill went up to 143.88 with internet and home phone and they will not let me cancell home phone service that is not used
I live in Canada and believe Bell is AT&T as well. If I can join this or any other lawsuits against them. They did all this to me. I returned equipment and the next bill is $35. Than I get a bill the next month, to give me time to loose the reference number, for $350 for set loss. They did the same thing to my supervisor and sent it to collections. She got the illusive reference number from the store that scanned her equipment. They said they would remove it from her collections. They reduced it to $0 but it is still on her record.
I was deceived in am internet bundle. Many charged were hidden. There were always something added. My $166 quote ballooned into over $600 dollars.
I signed up for an on-line offer for residential internet in October 2019. I have a screenshot of the confirmed contract price for the following 12 months. However, each month I am charged $10 higher, a result of not applying one of the two $10 promotions that lured me in. I have 3 chat transcripts showing the reps (including supervisors) were very cordial, promising the next bill would correct all past errors. They were not corrected of course. On the last chat the supervisor finally acknowledged that even though he could see the October transaction and even though I had documentation of the contract, they could not honor it. I was careful to maintain a paper trail throughout because I have had similar bait and switch problems with AT&T before. I see from the original posting that this has been going on since 2011 and seems to be continuing today, so it seems like an opportunity to force a change in AT&T predatory practices. How does one go about joining a lawsuit for this?