Vonage approves $4.5 million settlement
Somehow, I managed to miss the extra $250,000 awarded in the settlement. It's really for $4.75 million.
File a claim by July 11, 2011
I've always wanted to do this:
*Start Lawyer Voice*
Were you a Vonage subscriber on or before January 3, 2011?
Did Vonage misrepresent to you "the scope of its promotional one month free and money back guarantee plans"?
Were you charged an improper disconnect fee, cancellation fee, or termination fee "despite requests for cancellation [in] violation of pertinent law?"
Are you nodding?
Vonage may pay you money!
*End Lawyer Voice*
Wait. Vonage got sued?
Basically, in January, Vonage agreed to a class-action settlement in the New Jersey District Court, related to a few promotional programs that Vonage had.
The settlement asserted that Vonage didn't satisfy its money-back guarantee and/or 1-month free offers when people tried to cancel their Vonage service.
Vonage disagreed. That's where the lawsuit came from.
However, since trials are expensive, Vonage didn't want the lawsuit to go to trial. Neither did the people suing because class action lawsuits are super-expensive. And lawyers are billed by the hour.
So the two sides settled.
The Settlement
Vonage does not acknowledge that they've done anything wrong as a part of the settlement but they are going to pay $4.5 million into a settlement fund.
If you were a Vonage customer up to January 3, 2011, and you satisfy certain criteria, you have until July 11, 2011 to file a claim against Vonage and get paid from the class action lawsuit.
Certain Criteria?
The details of the settlement and these certain criteria to get your payout are here.
There are 4 things that you might be able to get paid for:
- If you didn't get a full month of free service
- If you didn't get a money-back guarantee
- If you had to pay a termination, cancellation, disconnection fee
- If you had to pay service fees after you cancelled your service
You do have to have a claim related to a money-back guarantee and/or free month of service. If you got Vonage's service and didn't try to cancel it, you can't be refunded the cancellation fee that you didn't pay.
But if you think that you had to pay something you weren't required to pay, check out the website and see if you qualify.