Verizon Is Sued Over Cellphone
Verizon Wireless misled customers about the capabilities of an expensive new cellphone and disabled many of the handset’s key features in order to charge higher fees for its own services, a lawsuit alleges.
The suit, filed Dec. 30 in Los Angeles County Superior Court, claims the nation’s second-largest mobile phone provider promoted the v710 handset made by Motorola Inc. as its only model equipped with so-called Bluetooth technology. Bluetooth enables phones and other devices such as computers and personal digital assistants to communicate wirelessly with each other over short distances.
But, the suit alleges, Verizon never turned on many of the handset’s key features -- such as the ability to transfer data between the phone and a computer.
“Bluetooth is synonymous with these kind of functions,” said software engineer Jonathan Zdziarski, 29, of Milledgeville, Ga., who bought the phone in the fall. “It would be like buying a car and then finding out you had to pay extra for tires or brakes.”
Verizon Wireless, which sells the v710 for a minimum of $249 with a two-year contract, limits its Bluetooth functions to enabling wireless headsets, car units and dial-up Internet connections. A spokesman for the Irvine-based firm said it would not comment on the suit, first reported in the Wall Street Journal.
The company is owned by Verizon Communications Inc. of New York and Vodafone Group of Britain.
The suit, which asks for unspecified damages, was filed by two California residents: Grant Opperman of Dublin and Timothy Davis of Bakersfield. It asks the court for class-action status, noting that many of Verizon’s 42 million customers may have bought the phones.
Lawyer Michael Kelly of Los Angeles said Opperman and Davis would not comment. Complaints about the phone have been circulating on Web logs and Internet forums since shortly after the phone was offered by Verizon Wireless in August.
Vito Asaro, who oversees the information technology department for Bartell Hotels of San Diego, said he bought the phone expecting the Bluetooth function would allow him to wirelessly transfer addresses, phone numbers and appointments from his computer to his phone.
“Anything that could cut down on always searching for the right cable to use to hook up something is valuable,” he said.
Telecom industry analyst Charles Golvin said customers had a “reasonable expectation” that functions such as wireless data transfers would be included in a Bluetooth phone. That was particularly true, he said, of the tech-savvy subscribers who were among the first to buy it.
