Cell phone contracts don't hold up…again

We don’t think we’ve mentioned this explicitly yet as a reason we deplore cell phone contracts: most of the provisions won’t hold up in court. Which, to us, means that they’re not fair. Why would we sign something that is so unfair that a court would overrule it? Furthermore, why would we support a company that tries to slip such provisions into their customer contracts? AT&T is feeling the heat of this now, as a judge has ruled that their “you can’t find a class action lawsuit” provision has been overruled. We absolutely love the court’s reasoning on this one:

In a 6-3 ruling, the high court said such waivers deny “plaintiffs a forum to vindicate the consumer protections guaranteed by Washington law and effectively exculpates its drafter from liability for a broad range of wrongful conduct.”

There’s nothing to say to that except: Rock on! We can’t better express how we feel about this ruling. If there’s one thing we can’t stand, it’s large corporations exerting their unwieldy power over consumers who don’t know better. Sorry, guys, but we don’t have teams of lawyers letting us know what’s lawful and what’s not. You do, so that should put the burden of responsibility on you (you being the telecom companies). Of course, the telecoms think their arbitration clause is consumer friendly. We honestly just chuckled at that. Check this quote:

“We continue to believe that a consumer is better off pursuing a claim under our arbitration clause, rather than pursuing a class action,” spokesman Walt Sharp said in a written statement.

Let’s examine the motive of AT&T to release such a statement:

1. Class action suits are bad for PR.
2. Class action suits more often result in a victory or large settlement for the plaintiffs.
3. Arbitration cases are one person vs. a huge corporation. Advantage: corporation. Class action suits are many people vs. a huge corporation. Advantage: consumer.

And there are surely more reasons why AT&T would try to avoid a class action suit at all costs. This gives the go-ahead for a suit against AT&T for improper roaming and hidden charges in subscribers’ monthly bills, which are said to range from $1 to $40 per month. Of course, this isn’t the first widely reported case of AT&T trying to screw over consumers. Oh yeah, there was something just yesterday on that, wasn’t there? [Seattle Post-Intelligencer]]]>