AT&T has agreed to settle a class action lawsuit that accused the company of selling DSL service at speeds it often never provided to customers.

The case, Robert Schmidt, individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated vs. AT&T and SBC Internet Services, Inc., (d/b/a AT&T Internet Services), was filed in 20o9 when AT&T customers learned the company was configuring some customers’ DSL modems at maximum speed rates below those advertised by AT&T.

AT&T has agreed to settle the lawsuit for a maximum of nearly $100 million, or less depending on the total number of claims received nationwide.

The amount customers are entitled to receive will vary depending on how much of an impact AT&T’s speed limiting configuration had on a their service.  The settlement is also retroactive back to April 1, 1995 meaning longtime AT&T DSL customers could be entitled to several hundred dollars in compensation.  For those dissatisfied with the speeds they received from AT&T’s DSL service, their compensation will be limited to a one-time payment of $2.00.

For some others, the settlement will provide more generous compensation.  The law firm that brought the case, Dworken & Bernstein, will receive up to $11 million in compensation and also get to hand out $3.75 million dollars of AT&T’s money to no less than 20 charities.

Some Background

AT&T provides DSL service to the vast majority of its customers.  This technology works over traditional copper wire phone lines.  Unfortunately, that infrastructure was never designed to carry data, but after years of development engineers found a way to make Ma Bell’s wires work for broadband service.  Unfortunately, the service has never been able to provide consistent speeds to every customer.  The further away you are from the phone company’s central office (where your phone line ultimately ends up), the slower the speed your line can support.  Someone a block away from the phone company office can easily achieve the speeds AT&T promised its customers in its marketing.  But if you are a few miles away, chances are you cannot.

For those more distant, or who live in areas with bad phone lines, your DSL modem won’t be able to maintain a consistent connection at the speeds AT&T sold you.  That will cause the modem to reset itself regularly, trying to re-establish an appropriately fast connection.  That can drive customers crazy because your service will often stop working while the modem tries to renegotiate the connection.  Some phone companies stop the constant reconnection battle by configuring the modem to work at a lower, more stable speed that will work with an individual’s phone line.

For instance, here in Rochester Frontier Communications advertises 10Mbps DSL service.  But for me, more than 10,000 feet away from Frontier’s central office for my area, the line simply couldn’t support that speed.  So Frontier locked the modem to deliver just 3.1Mbps, not the 10Mbps the company markets to customers in this area.

While that practice may seem technically smart, it’s obviously not legally smart, as AT&T has discovered.  Even using the traditional weasel words of “up to” when marketing broadband speeds, AT&T felt it was exposed to charges of false advertising and defrauding customers, and decided to settle the case.  It should be noted AT&T strongly denies any allegations of wrongdoing, but has agreed to settle to avoid the burden and cost of further litigation.

AT&T now faces the prospect of paying compensation to every DSL customer it speed limited in this fashion, and has also agreed to stop the practice.

The Details

Who Gets the Settlement? — Potentially any AT&T DSL customer paying for service after March 31, 1994.  This also includes customers of companies acquired by AT&T:

• SBC Internet Services, Inc., d/b/a AT&T Internet Services
• BellSouth Telecommunications, Inc.
• Pacific Bell Internet Services
• Southwestern Bell Internet Services, Inc.
• Ameritech Interactive Media Services, Inc.
• SNET Diversified Group, Inc.
• Prodigy Communications Corporation
• Oklahoma Internet Online

Many AT&T customers may have already been notified about this settlement through postcards or other mailers sent by AT&T based on customer records.

What Kind of Settlement Will I Get? — For longstanding AT&T DSL customers, the amount could be substantial, so it’s worth your while to participate, even if you are no longer a customer.  For most everyone else, it’s probably worth $2.00.

There are three types of benefits that will be paid to those who submit valid claims under the settlement once it becomes final. Payments will be made by check or by credits on a customer’s bill.

• Group A Benefit. If AT&T’s Records indicate that AT&T configured the downstream speed of your DSL service, for one month or more during the Settlement Class Period, at a level lower than the Maximum DSL Speed for the plan you purchased, you may be eligible to receive $2.90 for each month your service was so configured.  This could add up to hundreds of dollars.
• Group B Benefit. If you are not eligible for the Group A Benefit and AT&T’s Records show that your DSL service may have performed, for one month or more during the Settlement Class Period, at downstream speeds below the following levels, you may be eligible to receive $2.00 for each such month:
  • 200 Kbps, if you purchased a plan with a Maximum DSL Speed of 768 Kbps;
  • 384 Kbps, if you purchased a plan with a Maximum DSL Speed of 1.5 Mbps before October 2008;
  • 769 Kbps, if you purchased a plan with a Maximum DSL Speed of 1.5 Mbps after October 2008;
  • 1.5 Mbps, if you purchased a plan with a Maximum DSL Speed of 3.0 Mbps; or
  • 3.0 Mbps, if you purchased a plan with a Maximum DSL Speed of 6.0 Mbps.

  Because the settlement provides for monthly credits, you could also receive hundreds of dollars in refunds or service credits, making participation in the settlement worthwhile.

• Group C Benefit. If AT&T’s records do not show that either you fall within Group A or Group B but you nonetheless believe that your DSL service has not performed at satisfactory speeds based upon the plan that you purchased, you may still be eligible for a one-time payment or bill credit of $2.00. In other words, if at anytime you were underwhelmed by AT&T’s DSL speeds, you can file a claim and get two dollars back.

AT&T has also agreed to monitor customers’ DSL speeds over a period of 12 months and if service cannot achieve the speeds promised, the company will either make repairs to boost speed or adjust billing.

For AT&T customers in Missouri, Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas, and Texas, AT&T’s settlement would replace a similar class action case filed in St. Louis.  Ford and Dunne v. SBC Communications, Inc. and SBC Internet Services, Inc., would have only covered customers after December 31, 2000.

Customers who believe they are entitled to participate in the settlement can get additional information and file an online claim at the DSL Speed Settlement website.

North Carolina faces a moratorium on municipal broadband deployment.  On Wednesday, Senators David Hoyle and Daniel Clodfelter will introduce a bill expected to stall community broadband projects across the state.  The bill, which has yet to be seen by the public, should appear in the Revenue Laws Study Committee, co-chaired by Clodfelter.  We have heard the bill faces mere minutes of consideration before a quick vote, in hopes of moving it forward before the public finds out what elected officials are doing on their behalf.

Proponents of the moratorium argue that municipal broadband harms private industry and reduces tax revenue the state earns from those businesses.  But their argument lacks something — merit.  Missing from the debate are the actual numbers from the state’s largest telecommunications companies.  How much tax revenue does Time Warner Cable, AT&T and CenturyLink (formerly EMBARQ) generate?  We don’t know and the two senators (and the companies involved) aren’t saying.

Municipal broadband projects bring numerous benefits to North Carolina communities:

• jobs (taxpayers);
• high tech businesses moving into the state (taxpayers);
• entrepreneurial innovation that creates new small businesses (taxpayers); and
• benefits to the education and health care sectors (future taxpayers and keeping current taxpayers alive and healthy).

Make no mistake — a moratorium is just a stall tactic to protect current provider profits and avoid competition, all while giving them more time to organize a push for a permanent ban on such projects.

Why are Hoyle and Clodfelter only concerned with protecting incumbent telecom companies?  What about the rest of us?

Please join us tomorrow at the Legislative Office Building in Raleigh, and perhaps we can ask them.

Action Alert — We Need Your Attendance!

• Where: Legislative Office Building, Raleigh
• When: Wednesday May 5th at 9:30am, Room 544
• Why: Just having consumers in the room make elected officials nervous, especially when they are about to introduce a bill the public has never seen five minutes before a vote to move it forward in the short legislative session starting May 12th.

GOOGLE AND SEVEN INDUSTRY GROUPS OPPOSE NC MUNICIPAL BROADBAND MORATORIUM

Raleigh, NC – May 4, 2010   Google, Intel and six other private sector groups announced strong opposition today to a North Carolina municipal broadband moratorium being considered by the General Assembly’s Revenue Laws Study Committee, calling it “a step in the wrong direction,” “counterproductive” and “conspicuously in opposition to national broadband policy.” Legislation to prohibit municipal broadband deployments in the state is expected to be introduced and voted on tomorrow May 5. At least 45 individual communities in North Carolina, including Raleigh, Cary, Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Greensboro, Asheville and Wilmington, recently applied to partner with Google on its announced plans to build ultra-high speed fiber to the home systems.

In a strongly-worded letter to North Carolina’s House and Senate leadership, Google, Intel, Alcatel-Lucent, the Fiber to the Home Council (FTTC), American Public Power Association (APPA), Atlantic Engineering, Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA), and the United Telecom Council (UTC) stated that such a bill would harm both the public and private sectors. “It would thwart public broadband initiatives, stifle economic growth, prevent the creation or retention of thousands of jobs, and diminish quality of life in North Carolina. In particular, it would hurt the private sector in several ways: by undermining public-private partnerships; hamstringing the private sector’s ability to sell its goods and services; interfering with workforce development; and stifling creativity and innovation.”

“Enactment of a counterproductive municipal broadband moratorium would put North Carolina conspicuously in opposition to national broadband policy,” the letter states, and continues: “The Federal Communications Commission’s National Broadband Plan also admonishes states not to interfere with community broadband efforts where local officials do not believe that the private sector is acting quickly enough to meet community broadband needs.  Consistent with these expressions of national policy, communities across America are doing their share to contribute to the rapid deployment of broadband to all Americans.”

Those words echo a similar statement by FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn just last week in Asheville, NC. Commissioner Clyburn equated such a moratorium to denying citizens “the opportunity to connect with their nation and improve their lives” and called such a move “counterproductive,” one which could ” impede the nation from accomplishing the [National Broadband] Plan’s goal of providing broadband access to every American and every community anchor institution.”

A bill supported by Time Warner Cable and AT&T, the municipal broadband moratorium is being pushed by Senators Hoyle (D-Gaston) and Clodfelter (D-Charlotte Mecklenburg) for the alleged purpose of protecting the private sector and associated state tax revenues. But opponents to the bill argue the bill would hurt the private sector and even these representatives’ local constituents. Such a moratorium would terminate the City of Charlotte’s recent plans to build a multi-million dollar municipal network to provide broadband service to its public safety, educational, government institutions and the unemployed through the use of federal ARRA broadband funds. The bill also has the potential to make both Gaston and Gaston County less attractive to Google with whom they submitted an application to partner for a fiber to the home network.

“North Carolina should be lowering barriers to public broadband initiatives rather than establishing new ones, so that we and other high technology companies can spread and prosper across this beautiful state,” the letter states. At least 45 individual communities in North Carolina, including Raleigh, Cary, Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Greensboro, Asheville and Wilmington, recently applied to be partners with Google on its announced plans to bring  fiber to the home to between 50,000 to 500,000 households in an effort to unleash advanced scientific, educational, medical and environmental applications through these ultra-high speed networks, now being deployed throughout the world and in China. North Carolina already has two municipalities, Wilson and Salisbury, deploying these fiber systems to their residents.

Jay Ovittore, co-Director at Communities United for Broadband says, “A moratorium or any other barriers to “real” next generation broadband deployment would be a leap in the wrong direction for North Carolina’s citizens and for North Carolina’s economy.”  Communities United for Broadband is a citizen run advocacy group that promotes the exchange of ideas between communities, both rural and urban, to find the best solutions for their broadband needs.  You can find Communities United for Broadband on Facebook at http://bit.ly/aW6skP and on Twitter at http://twitter.com/CUFB

For more information:

www.broadband4everyonenc.com

http://groups.google.com/group/nc-public-broadband

http://stopthecap.com/2010/04/28/fcc-commissioner-mignon-clyburn-speaks-in-favor-of-municipal-broadband-projects-at-seatoa-conference/

http://www.muninetworks.org/

The Fiber to the Home Council also sent a separate letter to North Carolina Governor Bev Perdue.

You can continue to write the legislators who are pushing this industry written legislation.  Trust me they are hearing you. Be nice, but let them know you do not want a moratorium on muni-broadband, it will hurt economic development in our state and you want what the rest of the world enjoys for broadband access.

• Sen. Daniel Gray Clodfelter (Co-Chair) Mecklenberg [email protected] (919) 715-8331 Democrat (704) 331-1041 Attorney
• Sen. Peter Samuel Brunstetter Forsyth [email protected] (919) 733-7850 Republican (336) 747-6604 Attorney
• Sen. David W. Hoyle Gaston [email protected] (919) 733-5734 Democrat (704) 867-0822 Real Estate Developer/Investor
• Sen. Samuel Clark Jenkins Edgecomb, Martin, Pitt [email protected] (919) 715-3040 Democrat (252) 823-7029 W.S. Clark Farms
• Sen. Jerry W. Tillman Montgomery, Randolph [email protected] (919) 733-5870 Republican (336) 431-5325 Ret’d school teacher
• Rep. Harold J. Brubaker Randolph [email protected] 919-715-4946 Republican 336-629-5128 Real Estate Appraiser
• Rep. Becky Carney Mecklenberg [email protected] 919-733-5827 Democrat 919-733-5827 Homemaker
• Rep. Pryor Allan Gibson, III Anson, Union [email protected] 919-715-3007 Democrat 704-694-5957 Builder/TWC contractor
• Rep. Dewey Lewis Hill Brunswick, Columbus [email protected] 919-733-5830 Democrat 910-642-6044 Business Exec (Navy)
• Rep. Julia Craven Howard Davie, Iredell [email protected] 919-733-5904 Republican 336-751-3538 Appraiser, Realtor
• Rep. Daniel Francis McComas New Hanover [email protected] 919-733-5786 Republican 910-343-8372 Business Executive
• Rep. William C. McGee Forsyth [email protected] 919-733-5747 Republican 336-766-4481 Retired (Army)
• Rep. William L. Wainwright Craven, Lenoir [email protected] 919-733-5995 Democrat 252-447-7379 Presiding Elder

Don’t forget to thank those we have identified as on our side of the issue, for being forward thinking and truly representing the people:

• Sen. Daniel T. Blue, Jr. Wake [email protected] (919) 733-5752 Democrat (919) 833-1931 Attorney
• Sen. Fletcher Lee Hartsell, Jr. Cabarrus, Iredell [email protected] (919) 733-7223 Republican (704) 786-5161 Attorney
• Sen. Josh Stein Wake [email protected] (919)715-6400 Democrat (919)715-6400 Lawyer
• Rep. Paul Luebke (Co-Chair) Durham [email protected] 919-733-7663 Democrat 919-286-0269 College Teacher
• Rep. Jennifer Weiss Wake [email protected] 919-715-3010 Democrat 919-715-3010 Lawyer-Mom

New Apple iPad 3G owners launched a small controversy over the weekend about their discovery that certain video streaming services are showing lower resolution video (or no video at all) when using Apple’s new iPad 3G over AT&T’s wireless 3G network.

A range of sites pounced on the news.  It’s not easy to sort through who broke the story first, but by the end of the weekend, it developed a small life of its own.

iLounge was among the first to note serious video quality degradation when using the iPad over a cellular network, while it worked just fine over Wi-Fi:

…some video delivery applications act differently over the 3G network than they do on Wi-Fi. The iPad’s built-in YouTube application strips both standard and HD videos to a dramatically lower resolution over the cellular data connection, something that iTunes Store video previews notably do not do, instead staying at a higher quality and consuming a greater amount of data. Other third-party applications, such as the ABC Player, refuse to work at all over the cellular connection, producing a notification pop-up that states, “Please connect to a Wi-Fi network to use this application. Cellular networks are not supported at this time.”

YouTube streamed over AT&T's 3G Network on an iPad defaults to very low resolution. (Image: iLounge)

Electronista also jumped on the story, at first speculating AT&T may have had a hand on the speed throttling noting Sling Media ran into a similar blockade with AT&T before the wireless company relented and the software became available from the App Store.  PC Magazine quoted from the Electronista story (before Electronista’s editors modified their original piece) to build on the story.

By the end of the weekend, Electronista pulled back on some of their language in their original report and included a cryptic denial from AT&T, which claimed it was “a question for Apple.”

Stories of reported throttling and content walls will not take long to reach the public policy debate over Net Neutrality.  Is this an example of AT&T throttling Apple iPad customers and blocking them from accessing web content?

The answer, based on current evidence, is probably not.

There are technical issues behind the scenes which play a larger role here, but let’s begin with the average consumer and how a 3G network impacts on their “user experience.”

When designing a device like the iPad, engineers have to factor in usability and the overall impression customers will have using the product with a wireless network.  For many original iPad owners reliant on a Wi-Fi connection, pages render quickly, videos play properly, and applications that require higher bandwidth generally work fine.  Unfortunately, for those who lined up outside of Apple stores looking for the 3G wireless mobile broadband version of the iPad, the same may not always be true using AT&T’s 3G network.

AT&T promotes its 3G network as fast and capable of handling most any web application, including video.  But even the best 3G experience from AT&T is often much slower than a wired or Wi-Fi connection.  Despite the PR from AT&T, its 3G network frustrates many customers, especially in areas where cell sites are jammed with traffic or signals aren’t great.  Apple made sure larger-sized, streamed multimedia content seemed to work equally well on wireless by using adaptive video quality that can sense the speed of a connection, and reduce the quality of a video in order to make it play properly.  The theory is that a consumer using a handheld device probably wouldn’t notice the quality reduction on a small screen and would appreciate quick, uninterrupted playback.  Without such technology, a high quality video file can take longer to send over AT&T’s 3G network than it will take you to watch it.  That triggers the annoying “buffering content” pauses you see on slower networks.

AT&T officials told inquiring media “it’s a question for Apple,” which seems to confirm the reduced video quality is a function of the video player trying to adapt to AT&T’s speed.

Even with this in mind, some accused AT&T of employing social engineering to get customers to instinctively rely on Wi-Fi connections for higher bandwidth applications, reducing the demand on AT&T’s 3G network.

There is no need for a conspiracy theory like that when the simple, naked truth is far easier to grasp — AT&T has inadequate capacity and needs to upgrade their wireless networks to handle more traffic and sustain the speeds customers expect from a 3G-capable network.  AT&T is not purposely throttling the speeds of iPad 3G owners — their insufficient capacity results in a de facto speed throttle for all of their customers.  Unfortunately for those outside of the United States, the implications of AT&T’s slower 3G network can impact them as well.  Jesse Hollington in Toronto noted:

Unfortunately, these limitations don’t seem to be triggered by AT&T’s network, but rather in the iPhone OS or apps themselves, and the restrictions (at least on the iPhone) exist in every country where the iPhone is sold. There’s a general feeling outside of the U.S. that Apple’s kowtowing to AT&T’s “requirements” is actually ruining the experience for the rest of the world.

For instance, I can perhaps understand why YouTube videos need to be downsampled on AT&T’s slow 3G network, which even at peak performance is only 1.8mbps in most places.  As I noted above, however, Rogers up here provides 7.2mbps just about everywhere and provides better 3G performance than I get on some Wi-Fi networks. Yet we have to live with the same 3G restrictions as AT&T users do because they’re built into the iPhone OS.

That prompts the question what limits would have been “built-in” had AT&T’s own 3G network consistently delivered 7.2Mbps performance across its service areas.

As for ABC, and certain other content producers that restrict iPad owners to Wi-Fi viewing, that turns out not to be clear cut either.  ABC’s video streaming evidently exceeds a speed threshold that triggers the player to tell the user to use a Wi-Fi connection instead.  Licensing restrictions may also prevent the content from playing across a 3G network.

One of the most common arguments Net Neutrality opponents use to argue Net Neutality’s “unintended negative consequences” comes from bans on such adaptive speed controls.  Providers claim that by prioritizing or favoring certain traffic, they can maximize a consumer’s online experience so that they can use high bandwidth applications, as long as an intelligent network shaped the delivery of that traffic.

So one might ask, because adaptive video quality lets people watch their favorite online videos over AT&T’s 3G network, wouldn’t a ban on speed throttles make it difficult or impossible to provide a customer with access to that video?  Isn’t Net Neutrality a bludgeon that kills intelligent traffic management tools?

There is no shortage of techie-speaking, industry-funded Net Neutrality opponents that argue it regularly.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t hold up to scrutiny.

Net Neutrality does not ban software that can sense the speed of your connection and request an appropriate web stream that will assure uninterrupted playback.  Even ancient RealPlayer technology can adaptively adjust streaming quality based on what your connection will support, if the content producer supports it.  Such technology directly benefits the consumer (who can also often shut it off), whereas the kinds of traffic shaping providers advocate really only benefits them.

That’s an important distinction.  Too often, the kinds of “intelligent networks” providers speak of are designed to protect providers from “costly upgrades” and opens up new revenue streams by manipulating or limiting traffic and then charging users and producers to be exempted from them (for the right price).

AT&T Customers in southeastern Tennessee continue to get bill shock from company mistakes

AT&T continues to bill some of its customers across Tennessee for long distance calls that were supposed to be free under the unlimited long distance calling plans.  Stop the Cap! first reported this story back on April 12th, with company officials apologizing for what they called a “computer glitch.”  But the bills just keep on coming.

One Clarksville woman has been forced to call AT&T almost daily to address overcharges now exceeding $3,o00 for an AT&T Unlimited Nationwide Calling plan that is supposed to cost her $25 a month.

Although AT&T keeps crediting the overcharges on her account, Belinda Horton is exasperated having to first confront an inaccurate bill and then deal with AT&T customer service to credit back the charges.  That has been part of her routine for at least four months, with no resolution in sight.

“I’m not trying to get anything off of then and I don’t except charity, I just want them to fix my bill and fix it correctly,” she told WKRN News 2 in Nashville.  A reporter sat in on a typical call Horton makes to AT&T’s customer service to cope with the routine overcharging.  At the end of the call, the customer service agent tells Horton she’s sorry she can’t completely resolve the matter to her satisfaction.

Company officials continue to blame the billing error on computer problems.  Although Horton’s calling plan is supposed to let her make unlimited long distance calls for a flat monthly rate, the company keeps billing her calls by the minute at standard long distance rates.  The result has been staggering bills in the hundreds or thousands of dollars.

Belinda Horton from Clarksville, Tenn. is exasperated to learn she has been overbilled yet again while she speaks with AT&T customer service (Photo: WKRN News - Nashville)

WKRN News talked with Tom Jarkovitch at AT&T, who admitted the glitch has impacted 15,000 Tennessee residents.

“There were a few folks, those are the ones were working on manually and again, as a sub set of people that were not captured for whatever reason we think that’s going to be corrected in a matter of days,” he said.

Unfortunately for AT&T, there are indications the problem is impacting a larger number of customers than Jarkovitch admits.

Another customer in the Nashville area also being overbilled every month since last October said they had enough — they disconnected their AT&T service and went with a competitor:

“I have had the same problem since October of 2009. Every month, I have to call AT&T and ask why the problem has not been fixed. Again and again I am told that it should be fixed before the next billing cycle.  It is now nearly May and I still have to call them on a monthly basis. As a matter of fact, I just received my bill yesterday, and again, same thing. Well, that is my last bill because as of last month, I changed my home phone service carrier. I will no longer use AT&T services.”

With complaints like these still rolling in, the Tennessee Regulatory Authority (TRA) Monday compelled AT&T to appear to discuss the ongoing billing problems and AT&T’s plans to resolve them once and for all.

AT&T’s legal counsel, Guy Hicks, apologized for AT&T.

“It has already gone on too long, and for that AT&T apologizes,” Hicks told the Authority.

Month after month, many AT&T Unlimited long distance customers in Tennessee are billed by the minute for every long distance call, leading to staggering bills like this.

But Hicks also claimed the problem only impacted customers from periods ranging from August 18 to September 8 and October 31 to December 2, a claim that doesn’t ring true in light of Belinda Horton’s ongoing billing issues.

When asked specifically whether every dime unjustly charged to Tennessee customers had been refunded, Hicks did not say yes, instead claiming that “the vast majority of credits or refunds have been made and are continuing to be made.”

“As late as Friday, we were called and charges were still on their bill,” said TRA’s Tevin Thompson. “She didn’t have a paper bill yet, but she was quoted a total, and there were still errors on the bill.”

Our Take

It was disappointing to see the TRA praising AT&T at the end of Monday’s meeting.  This is an ongoing nightmare for some customers, and TRA officials seemed all too ready to applaud the company for its promises to fix the problem while Tennessee residents continue to be overbilled.  The time for praise comes after the company resolves the issue and every customer has been credited for every error.  AT&T has promised it would resolve these billing problems for nearly a month, with complaints still arriving even as the Authority met.

The Leaf Chronicle, the daily newspaper serving Clarksville, notes TRA officials seemed satisfied with AT&T’s Apologypoloza:

State regulatory directors appear to be satisfied AT&T has made an effort to correct a billing glitch that could have affected as many as 15,000 customers.

AT&T officials were called before the Tennessee Regulatory Agency on Monday to explain why some customers have been incorrectly billed for services since the fall.

“From what I gathered, the response they received (from AT&T) was satisfactory,” said Shirley Frierson, senior policy adviser to the TRA chairman. “That is as long as in a month or so, we don’t get more complaints about the same problem.”

At this point, appropriate compensation for impacted customers that have coped with overcharges for months on end should be more than simply crediting back their mistakes.  For folks like Belinda Horton, a year of free long distance calling would go a lot farther to demonstrate AT&T’s goodwill.  After all, she had to spend countless hours trying to fix a problem that wasn’t her fault.  Take it out of AT&T’s massive lobbying budget and do the right thing by your customers.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WKRN Nashville ATT Overbilling in Tennessee 4-27-10.flv[/flv]

WKRN-TV in Nashville spoke at length with Clarksville resident Belinda Horton who faced months of staggering phone bills.  The reporter even sat in on a call Horton made to AT&T customer service.  (2 minutes)

[flv width=”480″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WSMV Nashville ATT Answers To Long-Distance Billing Errors 4-26-10.flv[/flv]

WSMV-TV in Nashville also spoke with Horton and covered Monday’s meeting with the Tennessee Regulatory Authority, a public utility commission, over ongoing AT&T billing problems.  (2 minutes)

[flv width=”368″ height=”228″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WTVF Nashville ATT Meets With Regulators Regarding Overcharging 4-27-10.flv[/flv]

Finally, WTVF-TV in Nashville also ran a report showcasing Horton’s billing problems and interviewed an AT&T representative about what will be done about it.  (2 minutes)

More evidence arrived this week that Internet Overcharging schemes are becoming a thing of the past for many global broadband users.

Sky has announced it is getting rid of its usage limits and speed throttles for most of its broadband customers.  It’s also giving away a free speed upgrade to up to 20Mbps for its DSL-provisioned broadband service.

“It comes with no usage caps, fair use policies or traffic management, making it ideal for those who want the freedom to download emails, photos, TV programs, movies and games. It’s also ideal for those who want to access live and on-demand TV through Sky Player,” Sky said.

That may be part of the plan.  Sky, a satellite television company serving the United Kingdom, is preparing to launch new video on demand features that will work in conjunction with its broadband service.  Delivering faster access, without limits, could be part of the equation of making their video on demand service a success.

For occasional broadband users who don’t exceed 2 gigabytes of use per month, Sky is giving free usage-limited broadband service to customers who also subscribe to Sky’s telephone service.  For those that don’t, the 2 gigabyte-capped service costs £5 ($7.59US) per month.

For those looking for unlimited service, Sky Unlimited is available for £7.50/$11.38 per month for Sky customers with Sky Talk or £12.50/$18.97 per month for those without.  In the United Kingdom, line charges for the phone line are broken out from broadband pricing and have to be considered towards the total monthly cost for broadband service.  Line rental from BT costs £12.50/$18.97 a month for customers who pay by direct debit and receive paper billing (£11.25/$17.08 with paperless billing).

Sky requires a 12 month service commitment.  These prices and plans take effect June 1st.  New customers can get a promotion offering six months of free broadband service, including line rental, when signing a 12-month service commitment.

New customers can get six months of broadband service for free when signing up

Is there a downside to this offer?  Not as far as usage limits are concerned.  However, the service is dependent on BT-provisioned DSL phone lines, which can create great variability in the maximum actual speeds customers receive.  The further away from a BT exchange office, the slower the maximum speed a customer will achieve.

But for existing Sky satellite customers looking for a discount on bundled service and an end to worries about monthly usage or speed throttles, Sky Broadband is a welcome relief for those tired of Internet Overcharging schemes.

It’s also one fewer example North American providers can point to as an excuse to attempt Internet Overcharging schemes of their own.