AT&T & FTC Lawsuit: Phone Carrier Sued Over Unlimited Data Throttling
AT&T is being sued by the FTC for their data plans. The lawsuit alleges that AT&T's "unlimited data" plans come with a catch and that they are confusing to customers.
If you are an AT&T customer, you likely do not have an unlimited data plan. Unless you were grandfathered into an unlimited plan, you likely pay for your data based on how much data you think or AT&T thinks you will use.
The issues go back to about 2011 when AT&T got rid of their truly unlimited plans and started throttling customers. Throttling is a wireless carrier's way to slow down data hogs.
A data hog is someone who uses excessive data. Excessive data to AT&T could mean as little as one gigabyte of data (GB).
With all of the streaming and video-rich websites, it is not too hard to go way over your plan.
The FTC is alleging that AT&T improperly throttled customers without telling them and slowed down their data speeds when they reached a certain point. This caused many customers to cancel their contracts and pay hefty early termination fees.
"If you make a promise about unlimited consumer service, we expect you to fulfill those promises," Edith Ramirez, the agency's (FTC) chairwoman said.
AT&T disagrees with the lawsuit and calls the lawsuit "baseless."
Update: Latin Post spoke to a senior manager at the Austin, Texas call center via phone. She said that "no wireless carrier has a truly unlimited plan anymore... [been] gone for years."
The lawsuit was filed Tuesday and received by AT&T.
Customers who routinely went over their data plans would see their speeds reduced by 60-95 percent. AT&T began throttling customers at around the 2 GB mark.
"Consumers have been complaining about throttling for years," said Delara Derakhshani, policy counsel for Consumers Union. "We're glad the feds are going after companies that are ripping people off."
Here is the copy of the lawsuit.
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