In re USF Telephone Billing Practices Litigation

On Februrary 22, 2009, Judge John W. Lungstrum rejected AT&T's request for either judgment as a matter of law or a new trial. On November 19, 2008, a Kansas jury awarded a class of AT&T's California residential customers nearly $17 million. The five-week trial culminated in a unanimous verdict on Plaintiffs' breach of contract claim. The award of $16,881,000 represents 100% of the damages claimed by the class and is subject to mandatory pre-judgment interest. Pre-judgment interest will add millions to the total amount AT&T owes its current and former customers.

In re Universal Service Fund Telephone Billing Practices Litigation (D. Kan.) alleges that AT&T, Sprint, and MCI conspired with regard to the imposition of USF charges on their business customers throughout the U.S. and on AT&T's residential customers in California. This lawsuit alleges that the Big Three long-distance companies acted in concert to impose their USF obligations on their customers, conspired in the method of collecting for those charges, over-collected what the FCC actually charged them for USF, and misrepresented the nature of the USF fee as an unavoidable "tax" on their customers.