The Federal Trade Commission has charged wireless carrier T-Mobile of adding fake charges totalling hundreds of millions of dollars to customer accounts without their consent. A case was filed today alleging the wrongdoing in a suit in the U.S. District Court.
The Complaint says that T-Mobile was involved in “cramming” which is a practice where the telephone carrier places charges for services from third party companies on consumers bills without even telling them. These charges were for things like flirting tips, horoscope info, celebrity gossip which could amount to $9.99 per month. T Mobile gets 30%-40% of the third party fees and forwards the rest to the merchant.
The Federal Communications Commission also announced that is is starting a full scale investigation concerning T-Mobile’s practices.
Jeffrey Newman represents whistleblowers
