AT&T Mobility, RadioShack hit with 3G netbook class-action lawsuit: $5,000 overage bill riles plantiff

A class-action lawsuit with potentially far-reaching legal, policy and business implications has been lodged against AT&T Mobility and RadioShack Corp. over a novel 3G netbook data plan.
The litigation, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, was triggered after a woman received a bill for more than $5,000 after purchasing a $100 netbook bundled with a two-year AT&T Mobility DataConnect service contract.
“Although the customer service summary informed plaintiff and other consumers that their first bill might be higher than expected because of a $36 activation fee, one month’s service billed in advance, and prorated charges and fees for the month when the customer signed up, neither plaintiff nor other consumers were informed, nor could they have reasonable discerned from the paper work that wireless Internet usage exceeding 5GB per month would result in astronomical charges running into the thousands of dollars,” the lawsuit stated.
The class-action complaint brought by Billie Parks on behalf of herself and others accuses AT&T Mobility and RadioShack of common law fraud and violation of state consumer protection acts in connection with allegedly false, misleading and inaccurate advertising of the netbook DataConnect plan.
The suit seeks recovery of all sums paid for additional charges under the AT&T Mobility DataConnect plan; rescission of the RadioShack/AT&T Mobility DataConnect contracts; unspecified damages due to alleged harm to plaintiff’s credit; a temporary and permanent injunction forbidding the enforcement of the additional charges provision of the AT&T Mobility DataConnect contract; attorney fees and costs; and class-action certification of the suit. Parks is represented by the law firm of Thomas & Terrell in Oklahoma City.
“We are reviewing the case and have no comment at this time,” said Marty Richter, a spokesman for AT&T Mobility.
RadioShack did not respond to a call and an e-mail requesting comment.
It remains unclear – as legal and practical matters – whether the litigation could have the effect of blowing up an emerging wireless broadband business model in which subsidized, low-end netbooks are married with 3G networks.
In the wired world, consumers are used to consuming massive amounts of data from the Internet without incurring extra charges. However, wireless providers must carefully manage their radio spectrum inventories to support voice and data applications. That has its own challenges. Complicating matters further for wireless carriers is that the government’s supply of airwaves is dwindling at a time when future revenue projections are based on increased data and content usage by consumers. On top of that, some companies and advocacy groups continue to urge policymakers to make wireless networks open to all non-harming devices and applications. Such an across-the-board rule could make it harder for wireless service providers to manage their networks.
In the marketplace, the question is whether wireless broadband consumers are willing to embrace a trade-off giving them on-the-go access to the Internet in exchange for cost-prohibitive Internet data restrictions. As such, wireless providers could find it a major challenge trying to replicate consumers’ wired broadband experience.
AT&T Mobility, along with Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel Corp., have previously acknowledged that they cap wireless data use at 5 GB per month.