Cell Phone Company Sued for Early Termination Fee
Posted by
Elaine MandelNovember 14, 2006 10:42 AMCell phone carrier T-Mobile is sued for charging a flat rate $200 early cancellation penalty. The suit seeks damages for consumers in 13 states.
Cell phone provider T-Mobile has a flat $200.00 cancellation fee if you decide to switch carriers before your contract term is up. Whether you have a week, a month or a year left on your plan, you get hit with that $200 early termination penalty. Even if you want to switch carriers because of bad customer service, you pay that $200 fee. A lawsuit affecting customers in 13 states, including California, was just filed. The suit alleges T-Mobile's practice violates consumer protection laws.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court here Friday, claims the $200 flat fee that T-Mobile charges when customers cancel service before the end of a contract violates consumer protection laws in 13 states.If certified as a class action, the lawsuit would cover customers in 13 states, including Idaho and Washington -- potentially hundreds of thousands of people with damages in the tens of millions of dollars, attorneys said.
Class action cases like the one filed against T-Mobile are a great benefit for consumers. No one individual can afford to sue T-Mobile to get back their $200. But add up everyone's claim, and now the consumers have some power to stop unfair business practices.
Our firm handles numerous class action cases, including claims against Toshiba for selling laptop computers that don't work as quickly as they are advertised. These kind of cases give power to the individual to get justice and compensation for claims that would otherwise be too small to justify filing a lawsuit. But by banding together, and by using class actions to do so, corporations' unfair practices can be stopped.