Verizon To Pay $25M For Years of 'Mystery Fees' 215
Ponca City writes "The Washington Post reports that the FCC has reached a record $25 million settlement with Verizon Wireless over the company's wrongly charging subscribers 'mystery' Internet fees over the past several years — the largest settlement in FCC history. With the action, Verizon Wireless's total costs associated with false data fees reached $77.8 million, one of the largest payouts for false business practices in the communications services industry. 'People shouldn't find mystery fees when they open their phone bills — and they certainly shouldn't have to pay for services they didn't want and didn't use,' says FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. 'In these rough economic times, every $1.99 counts.' Verizon Wireless said in a news release that its overcharges were inadvertent. 'We accept responsibility for those errors, and apologize to our customers who received accidental data charges on their bills.'"
Right. "accidental". (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:5, Insightful)
So, for Verizon, this was a profitable venture. And profitable for whoever the fine is paid to as well, right?
Doesn't this all feel more like an incentive to continue this behavior if the full amount of the money wasn't refunded in addition to the fine?
Even if this instance weren't profitable, it'd still be incentive to continue doing other things like this. If you get caught, just pay it back, no harm no foul. And if you don't get caught, well, then you made out in the end.
Isn't this is exactly the kind of behavior that the possibility of punitive damages in a court settlement is supposed to prevent? If so, I realize punitive damages should probably only be awarded in the case of negligence, but it seems like if this has been going on for three years, it's hard to claim it's an accident and not be considered negligent in fixing it. But for some reason, the FCC decided they wouldn't pursue those damages.
IANAL, and I don't have much experience with the law, but I'm curious whether or not this still leaves Verizon open for a class action lawsuit. If this is has been going on for three years, with charges customers would have had to dispute each month, it seems like Verizon should reimburse their customers for the time they spent disputing the charges, and pay hefty punitive damages to discourage Verizon and others from doing the same thing in the future.
Assuming an average income of $32,000, and a probably conservative estimate of 15 minutes to detect, report, and rectify the the charges, each month, over 36 months, that's
$16/hour * .25hours/month * 36 months + $2/month * 36 months = $216 per person affected.
If 5% of the people were affected, that comes out to just over $1 billion in compensatory damages. On a conservative estimate.
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:5, Insightful)
The really amusing bit is that corporations are legally considered people, unless it's disadvantageous to the corporation in a given situation. Want to donate to a politician? You're a PERSON! Want to run ads blasting another politician? You're a PERSON!
Want to avoid the felony grand theft penalties PEOPLE face when they steal millions of dollars? Oh, well, OK, I guess you're not a person until the judge makes his decision on the penalty you face.
To my way of thinking, if corporations want to be considered people, then that's fine. But if the corporation commits a crime, it goes to jail, by which I mean no business transactions except for payment of debt, at ALL, for the length of the jail sentence. Verizon steals millions of dollars? Guess what folks? You're shut down for the 1-20 year jail sentence. Yes, that will ruin you, but you're the one who wanted to be a person.
Statistical significance test (Score:4, Insightful)
You know these things happen 'accidentally' because 50% of the time the error is in the customer's favour.....
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:2, Insightful)
The old rule of "never assign malice where ineptitude/stupidity/incompetence will suffice" seems to apply here. It could be malice. Could be intentional - but *really*. What engineer writes their software to intentionally miscalculate? These people pay mobile phone bills too.
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:3, Insightful)
I consider it malicious to be so profit driven that you willfully neglect the care required to avoid such foulups in the first place.
Tech fuckups happen, but it's still evil (tm) to just turn a blind eye and whistle innocently until someone complains about it.
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:3, Insightful)
Thing is by controlling the media the corporations have the politicians by the balls, since they determine who gets air time during election season.
Pissing off (or failing to kiss up to) a corporation that is exposing you to your voters is political suicide.
And self incorporation doesn't work.
The same corporations that control the media also don't much care for small fry on their turf, and they regularly can and do litigate their competition into oblivion. It is a legal jungle out there, where survival of the fittest reigns.
Human nature test (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:5, Insightful)
like how they characterized it as just some clerical mistake. I wish I made clerical mistakes that can net me $300 million dollars.
It'd be interesting to see how much of a dent this makes in their total income - it may be feasible that this was, in fact, simply a clerical error depsite the fact it'd be huge for the vast majorit of us. This doesn't justify it, of course, but I wouldn't rush to assume it was obviously malicious and intentful.
You know, I'd love to agree with you, but tell me this: What are the odds that they would be willing to allow a clerical error that lost them a similar amount of money?
Testimonial from someone who dealt with it (Score:2, Insightful)
A few minutes later, and she told me that all charges would be dropped. Reading this now, I'm just sorry I didn't push harder for the first month I had already paid.
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:3, Insightful)
and seeing these lists of small fees added on to all my bills, feeling really helpless.
A business attaching fees to your invoices is all it takes to make you feel "really helpless"? You know you could walk away from Verizon Wireless anytime you want, right? Wireless service is hardly a matter of life and death....
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:4, Insightful)
But rest assures, if there is proof that a CEO, Board Member, or any Manager gave orders to fleece the public, those people can and will be held criminally accountable.
And all the customers will get ponies!
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:3, Insightful)
and seeing these lists of small fees added on to all my bills, feeling really helpless.
A business attaching fees to your invoices is all it takes to make you feel "really helpless"? You know you could walk away from Verizon Wireless anytime you want, right? Wireless service is hardly a matter of life and death....
Yup, and pay a $400 early termination fee. Man, that'll really teach Verizon a lesson!
Re:An insult of a fine (Score:3, Insightful)
But in this, you are still neglecting that corporations are not sentient beings and they cannot make decisions or operate on their own.
Which is why corporate personhood is bullshit to begin with.