Missouri is slated to receive $282,244 in penalties as part of a national settlement reached with T-Mobile USA Inc. (NYSE: TMUS).
Through an agreement with all 50 states, Washington, D.C., the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission, T-Mobile must pay $90 million in penalties and restitution. The settlement resolves allegations the company engaged in a practice known as cramming, or adding third-part service charges to consumers’ phone bills without their permission, according to a news release.
The settlement action follows a fall agreement by T-Mobile, AT&T Mobility, Verizon and Sprint to stop billing customers for third-party charges. Cramming charges typically run about $9.99 per month for services such as text-message subscriptions, including horoscopes, trivia and sports scores. Consumers often found these services on their phones without having requested them.
The settlement includes $67.5 million in customers restitution, $18 million to the states and $4.4 million to the FCC.
Victims of cramming may request a refund at
T-mobileRefund.com.
“Cramming is an insidious practice that has cheated thousands of Missourians out of their hard-earned money,” Koster said in the release. “With this settlement with T-Mobile, we are one step closer to ending this practice once and for all.”
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