Class Action Blog : Consumer Fraud, Consumer Protection, Securities and Antitrust Lawyer & Attorney : Meiselman, Denlea, Packman, Carton & Eberz

A federal class action lawsuit has been filed against AT&T Wireless alleging that the carrier has violated the rights of at-home virtual call center employees under the California Labor Code.  According to the class action complaint, AT&T has hired at-home call center employees to provide billing and technical support for AT&T customers.  The complaint alleges that AT&T illegally mislabeled these employees as independent contractors in order to avoid workers' compensation costs, to avoid paying state and federal taxes, and to circumvent wage and hour requirements in violation of the California employment laws.  For example, state minimum wage rules, lunch break requirements, and overtime laws protect employees but not independent contractors.  The lawsuit says that even though these workers were labeled as "independent contractors", they are required to perform work at the times dictated by AT&T and in the manner directed by AT&T such that these workers are properly labeled as employees and are entitled to all the protections afforded to employees which are not available to independent contractors.  Most states have laws protecting employees which are similar to California's  laws at issue in this lawsuit.

If you work under similar circumstances and your employer labels you as an "independent contractor" rather than as an "employee", please contact Meiselman, Denlea, Packman, Carton & Eberz P.C. to discuss your legal rights.

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Users of cellular phones have unfortunately grown accustomed to seeing a series of seemingly small, and inexplicable, "surcharges" on their monthly bill.  These add up, and over the life of a contract, can total significant sums. 

Rather than explain -- or better, remove -- these fees, AT&T is now charging consumers a surcharge to protect against false charges imposed by AT&T!

Many of these surcharges relate to fees for data usage.  While a consumer readily can assess how many minutes are used by a phone call, knowing how many megabytes of data are being transferred is substantially harder to limit and control.  Consumers regularly receive monthly bills showing data charges in the hundreds of dollars for unknowing, or unwitting, use.  In many cases, an application was running in the background without the consumer's knowledge and, often, without the consumer obtaining any benefit.  Or a simple text message, attaching a picture, is charged once for the text message and yet again for the data transfer of the picture.  In still other cases, the data charges are entirely wrong.  Many consumers insist they do not send or receive any data and simply use their phone as, well, a phone. 

So, the simplest solution may be to just block data usage on your phone.  Unless, of course, you are an AT&T customer.

AT&T charges its customers a $10 monthly surcharge to block data usage.  AT&T knows that it is nearly impossible for most customers to track their data usage and this is the easiest way for them to generate huge fees.  So, they are unwilling to permit consumers to prevent any data related charges by simply blocking data from their phones -- unless, of course, consumers are willing to pay $10 for the privilege of not using a service.

If you or someone you know has suffered false or inflated data charges from AT&T, or have been unable to block data use without paying an additional surcharge, please contact us to discuss your legal options.

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Periodically, long distance phone scam causes consumers to inadvertently incur high charges on their phone bills.  Consumers usually receive a message telling them to call a phone number with an 809, 284 or 876 area code in order to collect a prize, find out information about a sick relative, or some other important information.  The caller assumes the number is a typical three-digit U.S. area code; however, the caller is actually connected to a phone number outside the United States, often in Canada or the Caribbean, and charged international call rates.  Unfortunately, consumers don't find out that they have been charged higher international call rates until they receive their bill.  As such, consumers should not dial area codes 809, 284 or 876, unless they are dialing a phone number they know will connect them to someone they know.

Indeed, since there are so many new area codes these days, consumers unknowingly fall for this scam.  There are reports on the Internet that if you call from the U.S., you may be charged as much as $100 per-minute.  Or, you'll get a long recorded message.  The point is, the scammers will try to keep you on the phone as long as possible to increase the charges.  And it may be difficult to have the charges removed from your telephone bill because you did actually make the call.

AT&T, for example, offers the following information and tips to consumers:

1.         Return calls to familiar numbers only.  As a general rule, return calls from numbers that contain familiar or recognizable area codes.  You may call your directory assistance or long distance operator to check the area code location; and

2.         Carefully read your telephone bill.  Make sure that you only receive charges from your provider of choice.  Ensure you thoroughly understand charges listed on your phone bill, have chosen to do business with all of the listed providers billing for those charges and have authorized additional fees invoiced.

If you believe that you have been scammed contact the carrier with whom the charge originated as sometimes the problem can be resolved with a phone call to the telephone company.  You may also file a complaint online with the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) about this and/or related phone scams.

If you have been scammed into dialing a phone number with an 809, 284 or 976 area code and your carrier refuses to remove the charges, or if you know who is behind the scam, please contact us to discuss your legal options.

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