WASHINGTON – In a complaint filed Wednesday, July 2, the Federal Trade Commission charged mobile phone service provider T-Mobile USA, Inc., with making hundreds of millions of dollars by placing charges on mobile phone bills for purported “premium” SMS subscriptions that, in many cases, were bogus charges that were never authorized by its customers.
On Wednesday, July 3, John Legere, President & CEO, T-Mobile released the following statement to the FTC Lawsuit:
We have seen the complaint filed today by the FTC and find it to be unfounded and without merit. In fact, T-Mobile stopped billing for these Premium SMS services last year and launched a proactive program to provide full refunds for any customer that feels that they were charged for something they did not want. T-Mobile is fighting harder than any of the carriers to change the way the wireless industry operates, and we are disappointed that the FTC has chosen to file this action against the most pro-consumer company in the industry—rather than the real bad actors.
As the Un-carrier, we believe that customers should only pay for what they want and what they sign up for. We exited this business late last year and announced an aggressive program to take care of customers, and we are disappointed that the FTC has instead chosen to file this sensationalized legal action. We are the first to take action for the consumer, and I am calling for the entire industry to do the same.
This is about doing what is right for consumers, and we put in place procedures to protect our customers from unauthorized charges. Unfortunately, not all of these third party providers acted responsibly—an issue the entire industry faced. We believe those providers should be held accountable and that the FTC’s lawsuit seeking to hold T-Mobile responsible for their acts is not only factually and legally unfounded but also misdirected.
