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Class-Action Lawsuit Accuses AT&T of Lying To Customers About DirecTV Now (kctv5.com)
A massive class-action lawsuit is accusing AT&T of lying to customers about DirecTV Now when it bought Time Warner. KCTV5 reprots: At the time, they promised customers and investors, they would be cutting prices for their streaming service called DirecTV Now. However, the lawsuit accuses the company of switching up TV packages, confusing customers by getting rid of the bundles it had been offering, charging higher prices for new types of bundles, and then bringing back the original bundles at a higher price. Investors were not happy about this because stock prices tanked. DirecTV Now was hemorrhaging customers, losing about 260,000 customers in December. "AT&T's registration statement 'touted yearly and quarterly growth trends... including quarterly subscriber gains in its DirecTV Now service sufficient to offset any decrease in traditional satellite DirecTV subscribers, such that AT&T was experiencing an ongoing trend of total video subscriber 'net additions,'" reports Ars Technica, citing a segment of the complaint.
"But in reality, 'DirecTV Now subscribers were leaving (i.e., not renewing) as soon as their promotional discount periods expired, while at the same time new potential DirecTV Now customers were unwilling to pay the higher prices and therefore not subscribing at all,' the complaint said. By the time AT&T bought Time Warner, 'AT&T's reported 'net additions' growth trend was already reversing into a severe 'net loss.' [T]he AT&T registration statement 'purported to warn of numerous risks that 'if' occurring 'may' or 'could' adversely affect the company while failing to disclose that these 'risks' had already materialized at the time of the acquisition,' the complaint said."
"But in reality, 'DirecTV Now subscribers were leaving (i.e., not renewing) as soon as their promotional discount periods expired, while at the same time new potential DirecTV Now customers were unwilling to pay the higher prices and therefore not subscribing at all,' the complaint said. By the time AT&T bought Time Warner, 'AT&T's reported 'net additions' growth trend was already reversing into a severe 'net loss.' [T]he AT&T registration statement 'purported to warn of numerous risks that 'if' occurring 'may' or 'could' adversely affect the company while failing to disclose that these 'risks' had already materialized at the time of the acquisition,' the complaint said."
Kinda like 5GE isn't it? Make that shyte up and trowel it out.
These mergers are always sold as "synergy, better service for less cost". They always turn out to be "Less competition, higher prices, folks out of jobs".
Only the lawyers get rich. And the companies don't pay enough to hurt them.
Corporatism != Free Market
the only thing AT&T will have left is a dial tone patent and cross connect fees. big iron got rusty and their retirees are not following their insurance and lawyers presented actuarial tables for unfunded liabilities and debt relief. oh well, momma bell sad to see you with and die, but hey, you had a good run. had to cute down a pine tree the other day, sad, but was encroaching upon my home and insurance company was frowning at me. oh well, from nut to nuthing.
I had this offer for DirecTV for $35/month for 3 months and a free 4K appleTV. Used it twice. Once to get my $160 appleTV for $105. The second to get another one and sell it for $120. Basically never used the service itself which was COMPLETELY USELESS. Most channels had GARBAGE and you could not skip the commercials (if you came back to the channel after surfing away, you got hit by the commercial again... ah, the beauty of streaming). So it is Netflix, Tubi or TPB for me and that's it. (But I have been considering subscription for Mubi... seems an interesting idea.)
As a long suffering DTVNOW subscriber (now moving on to PlayStation Vue), I can assure ATT investors that the cause of DTVNOW's decline has far, far more to do with their completely shitty service than any promo expirations. Having tried a few streaming services, I can safely say DTVNOW is the absolute worst. I would have abandoned it long ago if they weren't the only service with my favorite channel (TVG). Fortunately, that channel is now available separately for a nominal fee, and so adios DTVNOW! The buffering, inexplicable failures, lost DVR content, and just general garbageware that is DTVNOW (bordering on fraud) has driven away many many more subscribers than the $10 price bumps (after all, pretty much every other service has bumped their prices too)
They've been lying for years.
Oh, that's Direct TV Now?
Oh, that's different. Never mind. This is Emily Litella.
/Actually, it's not different. It's business as usual.
I have an account but can't be buggered to log in. Anyway, I was a DTV customer of theirs for quite a while, and I loved the package I was on, I wish it carried my local stations, but you can't win them all. Then one day I got an email from DTV saying, in essence, "Hey, that cool package you're on? Yeah, you're losing it. But here's the replacements!" The new packages had half the stations, same cost, no local stations....and I couldn't get everything I wanted that I had before, and they TRIPLED the cost of HBO.
No thanks. So I dumped them. Instantly. Hopped over to Playstation Vue, got all the previous stations, HBO and Showtime, and all my local stations (which was pretty awesome), and the only station I lost was the History channel. A small price to pay considering the cost remained the same for me--oh, and HBO and Showtime were included in the cost.
So, if some twat from DTV sees this: this is why you lost me, and lots of other people--your abject stupidity and greed. You didn't listen to the customers, you didn't provide good service, and your prices upon change to the "new format" were shit. This is ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT.
I sincerely hope the class action process nets me as little as 10 dollars, because to me, that's the pound of flesh I would be happy with to show them how utterly stupid AT&T became. They had been in a prime position....and squandered it. Fuck 'em.