Verizon Sneaks Extra Charges into Customer Bills, Class Action Lawsuit Says

Verizon Wireless teamed up with a warranty provider to secretly add extra charges to customer bills without properly notifying them or providing them any sort of contract in writing, a new class action lawsuit alleges.

Plaintiff Stephen Simoni’s proposed class action lawsuit against Verizon and warranty provider Asurion was moved to a New Jersey federal court Friday, because the potential Class of impacted customers is more than 150,000 across multiple states with charges over $10 million, the lawsuit states. 

Simoni previously filed a lawsuit that did not name Asurion, but removed it voluntarily and filed this most recent complaint against both Verizon and Asurion.

The Wyoming resident alleges the pair conspired to sneak unauthorized charges for Asurion Warranty Services Inc.’s “smart home support” plan into customer bills, and then hide it.

“Verizon and Asurion fraudulently cram customers’ bills with surreptitious charges for Asurion’s Total Home Support and conceal them with paperless billing, automatic payments, and deliberate failure to send promised sales confirmations and “next bill summaries.””

According to Simoni, one of his wireless phones got damaged between November and December 2019 and he initiated a claim for insurance coverage through Verizon’s carrier, Asurion.

While working with an Asurion agent to process the claim, the agent solicited Simoni to purchase a monthly “Smart Home Support” protection plan that would cover other household devices, according to the class action. 

Simoni says Asurion told him he would receive an email explaining more about the plan and its terms and said he could cancel it at any time, with the info to cancel in the email. He never got a “confirmation of sale” email for the protection plan. 

“[Simoni] recognized that the contract for the purchase therefore had not been consummated and did not pursue any effort to purchase it,” the lawsuit says.

However, Verizon started adding the monthly Asurion charge to his Verizon bill without him realizing it. Simoni says he only became aware that he had been charged for the plan nearly a year later, when he got a paper receipt and account summary while purchasing a new wireless phone.

He later contacted Verizon and demanded reimbursement. The company “only provided a minimal refund and blamed [him] for not having read his monthly paperless bills.”

By signing Simoni up to the service without providing a contract, and then pushing him into paperless billing to conceal it, Verizon and Asurion violated New Jersey’s Consumer Fraud Act, the class action lawsuit states.

Simoni is seeking to represent a Class of consumers who were charged for Asurion’s Total Home Support warranty in the last six years without a contract.

Simoni is asking for damages, restitution, statutory damages, punitive damages, sanctions, interest, court costs, attorneys’ fees and injunctive relief stopping the defendants from selling the warranty without a contract.

Meanwhile, in another class action filed against Verizon last year, an Arkansas couple claimed they fell victim to a Verizon “bait and switch” scheme in a two-for-one iPhone deal that was “purposefully deceptive, false, unconscionable, fraudulent, and also allowed Verizon to be unjustly enriched.”

Do you have an account with Verizon? Do you check your bills to make sure you haven’t had any additional charges added? Let us know in the comments. 

Simoni and the proposed Class are represented by Stephen J. Simoni of Simoni Consumers Class Action Law Offices c/o Jardim, Meisner & Susser PC.

The Verizon Asurion Hidden Warranty Class Action Lawsuit  is Stephen Simoni v. Asurion Warranty Services Inc. et al., Case No. 3:21-cv-04311, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. 

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