ATTWS Misleading Billing Practices

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Michael Meyers" <mail () michaelmeyers com>
Reply-To: <mail () michaelmeyers com>
Date: Mon,  3 Feb 2003 18:07:46 -0500
To: <farber () cis upenn edu>
Subject: for IP?   ATTWS Misleading Billing Practices


Dave, 

I thought this might be of interest to IP.

I recently became the victim of a deceptive billing practice by AT&T
Wireless and was wondering if you or anyone on the list was aware of their
billing policies regarding existing customers and the trial period on new
one/two year agreements.

Existing ATTWS customers should be aware that if they enter into a new one
or two year agreement and then cancel the new agreement before the end of
the trial period, the usage during the trial will be based on your previous
plan, not the usage plan for the new agreement.

In my case this lead to over $200 dollars in fees - while my new plan had
promotions that gave me free night and weekends and nationwide long distance
my old plan did not. As a result I am being charged for long distance fees,
exceeding the minutes on my previous plan, etc.

Prior to my agreeing to the new one-year contact I researched the details of
the trial period as I had recently begun spending a fair amount of time
outside of my main calling area and I was concerned about signal quality in
other areas of my region. In several conversations with representatives
regarding the details of the trial period, and in reviewing agreements, this
billing practice for existing customers was never mentioned.

When I refused payment on the additional fees and asked ATTWS
representatives to provide documentation supporting this billing policy. I
was told it was part of their Terms of Service Agreement.  Over the phone I
reviewed the TOS with a representative and they could not point out the
section that covered this billing policy, nor could they refer me to any
other document that covered this policy.

Today a supervisor I was talking to called me back regarding the lack of
documentation for this policy and I was told that, "it is not actually spelt
out this way in any of our contracts or agreements, but this is what our
policy has always been." When I asked if this policy was documented anywhere
in any form, and if I could review a copy, I was told that it was
"proprietary information" and that she could not release it to a customer -
however I’m still subject to the policy and I still owe them the money.

I would doubt many people have been affected by this issue - If you are
entering into a new agreement with your current provider you are likely
happy with your service or are unwilling to walk away from you phone number
after all these years – in any case it’s unlikely you would have reason to
cancel in the trial period of the new agreement.

Regardless of the number of people this affects I think it’s important to
raise awareness to the situation.

Michael




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