Congress Investigates Carriers' Debt Collections

Julie188 writes "'Tis the season for the government to crack down on abusive practices by your secretly evil national wireless carrier. Next up: a congressional committee will be looking into a debt collection practice that prevents customers from filing lawsuits. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) will be examining a contract clause that forces customers to waive their right to sue and instead agree to forced arbitration. He is hot on the tails of the carriers after a similar investigation of credit card companies lead to nine banks removing the forced arbitration clause from their contracts. This follows the week's earlier news that the FCC was going to try to come up with new rules to prevent wireless bill shock."

Comments

If you need an honest man

[ciaran_o_riordan]

I think Dennis Kucinich is someone that can be trusted to look after the people instead of pandering to business.

Re:If you need an honest man

[bsDaemon]

I heard he once told staffers of Nanci Pelosi and a pair of AIPAC lobbyists to get the hell out of his office and not come back. Word has it now he's denying it happened, but its the kind of thing he'd do, and really raised my estimation of him from that of cooky communist elf man to someone who also wants to tell AIPAC to go to hell.

I met him once by accident, briefly. However, he had wondered off before I could ask him to be in a short video clip saying "they're always after me lucky charms." His ears are slightly more pointed in person than they are on TV.

Re:If you need an honest man

[commodore64_love]

>>>Dennis Kucinich is someone that can be trusted to look after the people instead of pandering to business.

Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul. I saw them on television recently, discussing all the things they had in common. For example, both think the Federal Reserve (central bank) is a business monopoly that screws the customers by devaluing paper money, and should be audited at least once per decade to find out where the money is being spent, and possibly dissolved.

BTW binding arbitration doesn't mean much. Paypal tried to include that in their TOS but when they later were sued by State AGs for stealing money from customer accounts, the justice quickly nullified the clause as being in violation of consumer protection laws. He said that users cannot sign-away rights already protected by superior laws. Same applies here with the wireless carriers.

Re:If you need an honest man

[dkleinsc]

He's no communist, and he's definitely not a kook. He's my congressman, and I've spoken with him at several public events. The thing is, he has throughout his career taken stands that upset the rich and powerful, so they often do their best to portray him as a kook.

For instance, the most famous episode from early in his political career (as mayor of Cleveland) was refusing to sell Cleveland's municipal power company to the private company that controls most of Ohio's electricity market. The electric company's pals at the banks then threatened the city with default rather than rolling over the debt as they had been doing for decades. Dennis stood his ground, the banks made good on their threat, and Kucinich lost his reelection bid. But in the long run he saved residents and businesses in Cleveland millions of dollars in electric bills.

His more recent exploits include:
  * Refusing to support the Patriot Act.
  * Refusing to support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He consistantly votes against appropriations for those wars, and has been doing so since before they started.
  * Introducing articles of impeachment against both George W Bush and Dick Cheney.
  * Acting as one of the leaders of the backbencher holdouts for a public option in the health care reform bill. Unfortunately, Obama was able to convince him that HCR without a public option was better than no HCR, so he eventually voted for it.

The Democratic leadership doesn't give a damn what he does, though, because he's not good at getting oodles of lobbyist dollars (gee, I wonder why). So when he was running for President in 2008, the questions he got during debates were about whether he'd seen a UFO, not about his plans for reforming health care without mandating that everyone buy insurance.

Hmm this word you keep using...

[jeffmeden]

Tis the season for the government to crack down on abusive practices by your secretly evil national wireless carrier

That is the worst kept secret EVER. They are all evil, every last one of them, and if you don't know this by now then you must not have ever had a cellphone before.

Re:Hmm this word you keep using...

[Runaway1956]

Enumerate? 1. Subsidizing all those "smart phones" that are worth $500 to $800 (more?) by scamming the public into accepting expensive two year contracts. Yes, it's a SCAM! Sell those phones at their real value, be open and honest about what the phone really costs, then just sell phone service for ~$20/month, with unlimited talk and text, plus maybe another $20 for unlimited data. 2. Charging crazy rates for text. Everything that I've read says that it costs the phone company almost NOTHING to send out those text messages. 3. Accepting government funds to build infrastructure that never gets built. Phone and data companies are tripping over each other in the inner cities and wealthier suburbs - but the infrastructure doesn't make it out into the rest of the country. 4. Blocking local governments from building the infrastructure that the phone companies don't want to build anyway. 5. Sending out zillion dollar phone bills without ever even questioning the crazy amounts. I mean - if you sold a phone to an old guy who only calls his daughter once a week, and he talks for 10 minutes each time, then suddenly his bill is $20,000 - SOMETHING IS WRONG!!! Someone stole his phone, or your computers are borked! 6. Ironclad contracts that say that the company can never be wrong, never be liable, and if there is any question, review rules one and two. 7. Customer service SUCKS. They don't intend to serve any customers, it's just that simple. Enough?

Just ban "forced arbitration"

[jonwil]

They should ban forced arbitration clauses in any one-sided contract including credit cards, telecommunications service, cable service and utility service.

Re:Just ban "forced arbitration"

[TheGratefulNet]

and employment contracts!

those are even worse and we all have a lot more to lose on those.

want to work for another company? is it related to what you do now? there is probably a 'no compete' clause that is actually illegal in your state and yet still prominently listed in your contract.

cell phones affect 'the masses' and the worst that happens is you lose your phone and get upset. its a problem but its not 'americas biggest problem' right now. not saying employment is, either, but its FAR more life damaging if your company wants to put the screws to you than some stupid cell phone toy gadget. you NEED your job (or a job) to live. no one NEEDS cellphones, those are toys for the rich (even though every single commercial tries to convince you that 'everyone needs a cellphone'). I lived decades and decades without carry a portable phone. its NOT needed!

but jobs, those are needed.

forced arb. in employment contracts are far more evil an than any cellphone co.

and nothing is being done about the state of employment contracts.

arbitration is evil but why is congress only attacking the cellphone part of the problem?

Arbitration == Corporate Justice

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

Arbitration is essentially a system of parallel, private courts run by corporations, for corporations and for the express purpose of denying justice and avoiding the laws of the land. It's an absolutely corrupt system and should not be allowed to exist in any form whatsoever. Allowing seemingly innocuous instances of this practice has lead to private companies forcing rape victims to give up their rights. Corporation employees can abuse people in any way they please and can rely on their own private courts to avoid any reprecussions. Judges support this creeping privatisation of the judiciary as they are rewarded with handsome salaries as the private magistrates of these twisted courts.

Around the time of the Jamie Leigh Jones rape arbitration scandal, I remember speaking with someone in management about arbitration--I live in Ireland. He claimed that the trend in business--magazines, conferences and so on--was pushing arbitration heavily. As the "modern" way of doing business. The conversation sent a chill down my spine. The laws of my country and the people in it were being put in dire jeopardy, our legal protections being replaced right under our noses by this latest innovation in American savagery. At least I live in the EU; I can only imagine what must be occurring in Latin America or indeed the US itself.

Arbitration is lawlessness. It is rule by the powerful over the weak. It's not even a form of order, as arbitration courts have no strict rules, no obligation to consider precedent, no means of appeal, and are not even obliged to publish their rulings, let alone have an open court. The North Koreans have a more enlightened legal system--and again that is not hyperbole. Any society that accepts the rule of such courts has abandoned all pretence of justice and equality and has turned the clock back a thousand years before even the Magna Carta. And no other society should follow them down the path to ruin.

Re:Arbitration == Corporate Justice

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

And, you fail to point out, it is *completely voluntary*.

So is any con game. Victims are willingly tricked into deals designed to hurt them. But that's not enough to make it legal, let alone ethical.

Re:In California -

[TheGratefulNet]

I'd care MORE about employment contracts and forced arbitration.

note: sorry for the very long post, but its important as it deals with employment in the tech field.

I spent a good month dealing with an asshole company who would not give in on basic simple concepts. they created an employment contract, I rejected many lines in it and asked them to rewrite it. at first they understood that what they were asking for was illegal in california and unenforceable. a week later, their legal 'team' refused to edit even a single line in the employment contract. we tried another tact and gave them our own (I was going thru a middelman at the time) contract which I believed was a lot more fair to both sides. they refused.

this went around and around for over a month. in the end, I walked away, at the advice of pretty much everyone.

cellphones are BS, I can (and do) live well without one. nope, I don't own or carry one (at all). but I do need to have a job and the jobs are coming with 'strings attached' when you read the current crop of contracts.

even if you say 'this is not enforceable in XYZ state' they won't back off.

I learned one thing: when you get an employment offer, say 'thanks!' and then follow it with 'as soon as my lawyer reviews this, I'll get back to you'. non-confrontational but do NOT EVER EVER EVER sign an employment contract (these days) without YOUR legal guy looking it over.

the way it has to work (again, as I learned my lesson) is: my 'guy' will call your guy and they'll talk legal shit to each other. 'where did you go to law school? oh yeah, did you know so and so?' etc etc.

they connect and they review the doc and say 'you don't REALLY think its legal or fair to ask for clause #3, do you?' and it progresses with both lawyers comparing dick sizes (so to speak) and eventually coming to an agreement. what makes this work is that they both know that they know the laws and you can't BS a BSer. that's one key concept. the other is that you have to allow your layer to be the 'bad guy' and you should NEVER come off to the new company as the bad guy. you WANT to sign that contract but your lawyer (the 'bad guy') won't let you. you appear good to the new company but you also do NOT give up your rights.

in the end, the company respects you, you KNOW you have a fair contract and no 'cannot work for competitors for next 10 years' BS clauses in there. your lawyer played good cop/bad cop with you and the company and you get a straight deal.

if you do not do that, dollars to donuts you signed an indentured servant contract and didn't even realize it.

especially NOW when the econ is in the dumps, companies are trying to screw you over with your employment contract. they count on the fact that you are 'desparate' enough to sign anything.

don't object to HR when you are there. smile, thank them and tell them that as soon as your 'guy' checks this over, you'll be happy to sign it. then let your hired guy defend you before you sign that rotton scummy endentured servant agreement.

lesson learned! please use this procedure next time you get an offer letter. I've found that in sofware (my field) almost NO ONE reads or even tries to cross out any lines in their contract. get a lawyer. its not just for 'top execs' anymore. we ALL need those guys to review our docs and fight for us.

(you would not believe the legally unenforceable things in the text of my last contract. it made me and my recruiter pretty sick, I'll tell you.)

Re:Where's the technology?

[Sponge Bath]

Here is what AT&T charges above the advertised rate for my wireless:

Credits, Adjustments, and Other Charges:
* Regulatory Cost Recovery Charge: 0.66
* Federal Universal Service Charge: 1.04
* TX Franschise Tax Recovery: 0.30
* Texas Universal Service: 0.65

Taxes:
* 911 Service Fee: 0.50
* Tx State Telecom Tax: 2.72
* City Telecom Tax: 0.44
* City District Telecom Tax: 0.29

The important thing to note here is the "Credits, Adjustments, and Other Charges" section is not taxes. They are fees with names made up by AT&T to sound like taxes so customers won't complain. In reality this section is just an additional $2.65 monthly charge not included in the advertised rate. They should clearly state a rate for everything that is not taxes. But, of course, they are evil and regulation is weak so that will never happen.

Re:Ummmmm... No

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

The whole point is just to keep costs down.

Yes, and this is done by denying people their rights. It's much cheaper to pay a rent-a-judge to deliver the verdict you'd prefer; I'm not disputing that. But my position is that this is an illegitimate system, and is essentially lawlessness in a pinstriped suit.

Also please note that the KBR case is a bit of an oddity.

It was the purest form of arbitration. The whole rotten system was laid bare for the world to see just how corrupt it really was, and exactly what its true purpose is. There are numerous examples of companies having people signaway their rights with smallprint mines in contracts. It's fraud, and the financial system once again leads the way, with credit card contracts being rife with these crooked mandatory binding arbitration clauses.

The problem was that there was (and really is) no Iraqi justice system to go to.

So where there is no law, we must rely on private industry to make its own. No. Never. Better no law at all than a corporate one--and that's not hyperbole!