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T-Mobile Sued for Breaking Lifetime Price Guarantees

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T-Mobile customers have filed a lawsuit [PDF] against the carrier, alleging that it failed to honor a guarantee not to raise the prices of select cellular plans.

T-Mobile-Generic-Feature-Pink-1.jpg

The lawsuit, first spotted by Wired, claims that back in 2017, T-Mobile advertised several of its plans with a price lock, but then went on to increase prices starting in May 2024.

"T-Mobile ONE customers keep their price until THEY decide to change it. T-Mobile will never change the price you pay for your T-Mobile ONE plan," T-Mobile said in a press release in January 2017. T-Mobile ONE was priced at $40 per line for a family of four with AutoPay enabled, and T-Mobile made similar pricing promises for other plans, including the Simple Choice Plan, Magenta, Magenta Max, Magenta 55+, and Magenta Amplified options.

T-Mobile raised prices by $2 to $5 per line for the legacy plans, and while there was a price promise, fine print did give the company an out. T-Mobile released an FAQ that said if prices did increase, T-Mobile customers could cancel and get their final bill paid, a policy applicable for accounts activated between January 2017 and April 28, 2022.

The lawsuit claims that T-Mobile's FAQ wording is "contrary to the language" provided at the time that T-Mobile customers signed up for their legacy plans, and as such, T-Mobile has "breached its agreement" with customers and caused them monetary injury.

T-Mobile is being accused of making false or misleading statements, deceiving customers, and intentionally concealing plans to raise rates. Plaintiffs are seeking class action status for the suit, an injunction preventing T-Mobile from raising prices, restitution for "all amounts" T-Mobile earned from its misconduct, refunds for the additional money paid after price increases, and additional damages for injuries suffered.

Article Link: T-Mobile Sued for Breaking Lifetime Price Guarantees
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2024/07/26/t-mobile-price-guarantee-lawsuit/
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T-Mobile is scummy and has a long history of raising prices or changing your plan without your consent. I once had them keep rate of my plan the same but lower my data limits, minutes, and text amounts....better plans were offered at the same exact price point. Someone determined it was better to keep my rate the same but give me less services in return.
 
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sk1985 said:
T-Mobile is scummy and has a long history of raising prices or changing your plan without your consent. I once had them keep rate of my plan the same but change data limits, minutes, and text amounts....better plans were offered at the same exact price point.
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The John Legere years were a notable exception. I wish he had never left...
 
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sk1985 said:
T-Mobile is scummy and has a long history of raising prices or changing your plan without your consent. I once had them keep rate of my plan the same but change data limits, minutes, and text amounts....better plans were offered at the same exact price point.
Click to expand...

So who's the better player that doesn't do such things? I believe T-Mobile is just copying the lucrative practices of the other 2 dominant devils.
 
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ghanwani said:
They weren't very good at anticipating inflation. Those were the good old years with no inflation.
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2-3% annual inflation is normal. Lifetime price lock was merely a marketing ploy for then distant fourth T-Mobile to steal AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon customers.

Now that the price war is over (thanks to the US government approving the Sprint merger), T-Mobile can raise the price on existing customers instead.
 
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I signed up for T-Mobile One back then. Late last year, a phone sales guy in Target asked me how much I was paying for my mobile plan, and when I told him 2 unlimited lines for $100, he could only say "wow, yeah, hold on to that!" I know the promise was to never raise the price, but I filed that under "too good to be true." Prices pretty much always go up on everything. I actually wonder if we hadn't had this runaway inflation for so long if they would have been able to keep that promise. I mean, they have to pay their workforce and maintain and upgrade towers, and I'm sure none of that has gotten cheaper either. As much as I'm bummed I'm now paying 10% more, I actually understand the why. Probably not the popular thing to say, but I work at a company where we could use more money but can't get the price increase, and it makes delivering a quality product a lot harder.
 
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GuruZac said:
The US cellular market has little choice, and thus high prices. I have been with Verizon for 13 years. I have had incredibly consistent billing thus far, and while they aren't perfect, my service is decent most places I go.
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Agreed. We have been with them for 15 years and each city/town we lived in, Verizon proved out they the best choice.
 
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We need the various states Attorney Generals to deal with this rather than a class action that will be settled for peanuts.
I have a 2017 account, the clearly promised and induced to switch with a price lock, they made a bad deal but they made it. I hope the class action costs them dearly
 
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DamFu said:
I am sure there was no solicitation from lawyers for this suite and it really comes from customers upset at paying 2 dollars a month more
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All those $2 minus legal fees will allow them to buy a really nice suite.
 
Timpetus said:
The John Legere years were a notable exception. I wish he had never left...
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John Legere was somewhat like Steve Jobs in that he was looking to give more value to customers. T-Mobile's current CEO Mike Sievert is greedy and thus like Tim Cook in that he is looking to give less value to customers in order to maximize profits.
 
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ThomasJL said:
John Legere was somewhat like Steve Jobs in that he was looking to give more value to customers. T-Mobile's current CEO Mike Sievert is greedy and thus like Tim Cook in that he is looking to give less value to customers in order to maximize profits.
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Why did John have to leave? Did they force him out? Did Tmus not give him what he wanted? Did the board act against him?
 
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