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iPhone User Awarded $850 in Judgment Against AT&T Over Throttling

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I'm actually surprised that AT&T didn't get away with it on the "protection of the network" type clause in every contract. Bet they're kicking themselves for ever advertising unlimited.
 
Resevdog said:
First, why would I sign that contract?
Second, this would be a criminal matter. That's up to the state if they want to bring charges. On the civil side, I would think this would clearly fall under the "invalid contract" as there is no consideration on my part. What benefit am I receiving from this contract? There must be a bargained for exchange, or an altering of positions in some way for there to be a contract. Also, they must be matched expectations. If you were to give my $1 million to shoot me in the leg and in exchange I agree not to sue...well, then there MIGHT be something. But again, since the agreed to act on your part would violate the law (most likely) the contract would likely still be void.

Also unconscionable. And an argument for incapacity to agree to the contract could be made. No reasonable person would agree to get shot in the leg...
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Interesting thanks.
 
Stratus Fear said:
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I'm actually surprised that AT&T didn't get away with it on the "protection of the network" type clause in every contract. Bet they're kicking themselves for ever advertising unlimited.
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It doesn't help that they advertise "Only AT&T lets your iPhone download 3x faster then the competition :p
 
I wonder if unlimited data will ever be a reality again. It was amazing for awhile to know that you could stream an entire movie practically anywhere in the country, whenever you wanted to. Now it's been taken away and it's like we've gone back into the past.
 
WestonHarvey1 said:
I wonder if unlimited data will ever be a reality again. It was amazing for awhile to know that you could stream an entire movie practically anywhere in the country, whenever you wanted to. Now it's been taken away and it's like we've gone back into the past.
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Not until the CellCo's are just relegated to dumb pipes as they should be
 
5aga said:
its only $850... thats nothing to AT&T.. their bigger problem will be arguing against this ruling should there be a class action lawsuit. Which I hope some greedy lawyer does bring forward a Class action suit... it may force AT&T into giving up this ridiculous throttling stunt.
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Worst case scenario for AT&T will be that they need to offer the unlimited users out of their contracts early. THAT is what they will liekly do. If things get bad enough, they will push email, SMS, and snail mail to every unlimited subcriber stating that their unlimited data plan has been discontinued. If they are under contract at the time, they have until date xx/xx/xx to cancel that line without an ETF.
 
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rhett7660 said:
Next step, class action?!!?
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This guy won 850 bucks.... If you get involved with a class action suit after the lawyers are paid and then, you get 12 or 15 bucks...


This is why class action is the WRONG way to go...


Aside from that, per what the article said "class action" is no longer an option.. The corporations banked on the masses NOT filing a suit... The only way they get hurt is if 5 or 6 thousand win the same way this guy won... that way the corporation takes a huge hit in legal fees... However like I said, they bank on that never happening... To be honest, its a very safe bet...


I'm happy for him.... he got the money he deserved, and he didn't have to pay a dime to a class action vulture..

IMO
 
good for him. I know some people who have been throttled on here, called AT&T, complained but in a polite manner and they were "upgraded" to the 5gb w tethering plan and got 10 dollars off a month for text messaging, and another 10 dollar credit for the life of their bill. For someone like me, who plans on getting an iPad 3, this would be great. Pay the same price, and have tethering for my ipad.
 
dlowings said:
This guy won 850 bucks.... If you get involved with a class action suit after the lawyers are paid and then, you get 12 or 15 bucks...

This is why class action is the WRONG way to go...
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You don't understand class actions at all. You usually make more money because lawyer fees are 10-20% of the final amount. The problem with a lot of class actions is that the actual loss to each person was so small to begin with.
Aside from that, per what the article said "class action" is no longer an option.. The corporations banked on the masses NOT filing a suit... The only way they get hurt is if 5 or 6 thousand win the same way this guy won... that way the corporation takes a huge hit in legal fees... However like I said, they bank on that never happening... To be honest, its a very safe bet...


I'm happy for him.... he got the money he deserved, and he didn't have to pay a dime to a class action vulture..

IMO
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Actually, this is where AT&T is going to wish that they didn't have the class action waiver in their contract. They would *much rather* have one class action with 5,000-10,000 members in the class than have to defend 10,000 separate small claims suits spread across the US - it would likely cost them more in attorneys fees to defend these cases than they would pay out in damages.

And while corporations can reliably depend on individuals not to sue when their actual loss is only $15-$20, they can't depend on that at all when the people stand to make $850 or so.
 
Time For A Sue Mob?

Form a "sue mob". Tell everyone to file their small claims court documents on the same day. See what AT&T does when it tries to defend 10,000+ small claims court cases at the same time...
 
$850? I wonder how much the lawsuit cost him. I don't think it's likely that AT&T would appeal. Surely it wouldn't be for losing money.
 
Thank GOD

And the judge. Plain and simple here, AT&T's network cannot handle the DATA demand.

It's not rocket science people, CANNOT AND WILL HANDLE THE DEMAND.
 
koolmagicguy said:
$850? I wonder how much the lawsuit cost him. I don't think it's likely that AT&T would appeal. Surely it wouldn't be for losing money.
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how much it cost him, meaning what? I know where I live (tulsa, ok) its around 85-115 dollars to file a small claims suit. As for when it goes to court, its usually a month afterwards, you know well in advance, and can just take the day off from work if need be. As for actual monetary losses, there shouldnt be any. You dont have to have an attorney in small claims, thats the beauty of it.

I sued a guy in small claims for an accident which he was at fault. Had 6 cops in the intersection, he failed to yield turning left and I hit him. Didnt even have to call 911. He showed the cops his insurance card, when I called to make a claim, it was cancelled due to non payment. I filed with my insurance company, received a 5K pain and suffering check because I had just had back surgery 6 months earlier, and this caused a 2nd surgery. I ended up suing him for my deductible (500 plus court costs). I got a judgment against him, he failed to pay, so I filed the proper paperwork to get his wages garnished. When it was all said and done, that 500 dollars ended up costing him 862 dollars after court costs. Should have just paid the 500 like I asked!!
 
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I loved AT&T. Even when everyone was saying they were the worst. I could tolerate an occasional disconnect. I can even deal with throttling. But use a reasonable approach.
AT&T throttles your phone because you live in an area that has high usage. At that point it doesn't matter where you are because you will be throttled. Even if you are in a low usage market at 3am, you will remain throttled.
AT&T should take a page from Verizon. They base throttling on your usage and the workload of the specific tower you are connected to. That just seems reasonable and isn't likely to cause ad much bad pr.
 
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Perhaps it's time to file against virgin broadband. Our speed gets cut by 4 minutes after starting watching hd YouTube videos.
 
Outstanding. I hope this paves the way for a class action lawsuit against AT&T, and warns others to tread lightly regarding this 'throttling' garbage.
 
LOL @ AT&T. Theyre going to appeal this? Over $850? Thats chump change for them.

I thought Bell and Rogers in Canada were greedy scumbags... well they are too.
 
Sweetcheetah said:
So, why not go Sprint? I'm thinking about going to them. Are they any better? I'm due for upgrade to iPhone 4S from a 3GS. Both Verizon and AT&T have about the same quality of plans an data limitation. So there's Sprint to look at. T-Mobile? What's that?
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I don't know first hand, but have a lot of co-workers on Sprint. Considered switching as well when I got my 4S for the same reason. Asked them all, and every single one said that Sprint absolutely throttles. We loaded some webpages side by side with my 3GS and their 4G Android phones, and my 3GS loaded faster every time. Tried to pick pages I hadn't been too before so that there were no caching issues as well.

Just FYI, and still not from first hand experience as far as having Sprint as my carrier.
 
dlowings said:
This guy won 850 bucks.... If you get involved with a class action suit after the lawyers are paid and then, you get 12 or 15 bucks...


This is why class action is the WRONG way to go...


Aside from that, per what the article said "class action" is no longer an option.. The corporations banked on the masses NOT filing a suit... The only way they get hurt is if 5 or 6 thousand win the same way this guy won... that way the corporation takes a huge hit in legal fees... However like I said, they bank on that never happening... To be honest, its a very safe bet...


I'm happy for him.... he got the money he deserved, and he didn't have to pay a dime to a class action vulture..

IMO
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I did not know about the no longer an option....There have been some large class action settlements in the past, however a good majority are pretty small.
 
Plutonius said:
Yep, but it was going to end sooner or later anyhow.
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Sorry, legally they can't do away with the grandfathered plans (at least in California).

As for how much it cost him, Small Claims court is actually pretty cheap (I think the filing fee is around $50 in most areas), so really he made out on the deal.

The Article states that AT&T says a class action lawsuit would go against the contract, but I would imagine any competent lawyer could get that provision thrown out.

If I was getting throttled, I would consider filing a lawsuit too, but since they are not throttling me, there's no reason to do so.
 
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