A class action lawsuit filed in Yolo, California claims that T-Mobile deceptively marketed its mobile
phone data plans as unlimited, while capping data at 10
or 5 gigabytes before cutting off access to the 3G network and
drastically reducing speeds. The suit claims that the plan was falsely represented as unlimited.
Trent
Alvarez, the plaintiff, bought three T-Mobile smart phones last year that
required him to agree to a two-year contract.
"Nowhere on this
contract does T-Mobile disclose its invisible data cap," Alvares claims in
Yolo County Superior Court, and the company presented the plan as
"unlimited," and the sales rep didn't let him know about the data limit.
The customer did not know about the cap, until T-Mobile sent him a text
message stating, "Your data usage in this billing cycle has exceeded
10GB; Data throughput for the remainder of the cycle may be reduced to
50kbps or less."
The slowing of data meant he couldn't perform functions promised in T-Mobile's ads,such as sending
emails, downloading music and videos, and uploading photos and
applications, all at blazing fast speeds.
The plaintiff claims he
is locked into a two-year contract unable to experience the
unlimited data services T-Mobile promised.
The suit requests an
injunction preventing T-Mobile to deceptively advertise
its data plans. It also asks fro restitution for false advertising and
disgorgement of all profits T-Mobile made from selling the "unlimited"
plans.
The suit was brought by Jenelle Welling with Green Welling.
Usually, T-Mobile states that their unlimited packages are in line with their "Fair Usage" policy.
This little trick gets so many people so it will be setting the president for cases like these in the future.