Comcast Sued For Robocalling Woman 153 Times Over A Bill She'd Already Paid

from the if-you're-annoyed,-press-1 dept

Techdirt's very own Karl Bode had just written about Time Warner being forced to pay over $200k for robocalling a woman 153 times about an overdue balance that actually was owed by a completely different person. What with all the complaints that ISPs these days aren't forced to actually compete with one another, Comcast, in its infinite wisdom, decided to prove to the public that it will in fact directly compete with Time Warner on the battlefield of robocalling people about stuff when they shouldn't. Comcast's entry into the competition concerns the company robocalling Kia Elder about an overdue balance...that she'd already paid four years ago.

According to the lawsuit, Comcast customer Kia Elder was robocalled repeatedly by Comcast for an overdue balance of $527 she said she paid way back in 2011. Yet Comcast repeatedly called Elder "once or twice a day" between September 2014 and "at least through" June 18, and was incapable of updating its systems to show the bill had been paid despite repeated complaints. Elder and her attorney are now seeking $500 to $1,500 for each alleged Comcast violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. "Defendant acknowledged plaintiff’s instructions to stop calling her phone but did not stop," states the complaint.

Yes, Comcast apparently called Kia regarding a bill that had already been paid more often than a high school kid calls his ex to try to win her back. Kia reportedly complained about the calls, but they still kept coming. She tried to get Comcast to update its records to reflect the paid bill, but the calls kept coming. And now, thanks to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which essentially requires companies not plug up the public's cell phones with robotic corpo-vomit, she's seeking anywhere between $200k and half-a-mil-do as punishment.

Now, I'm not sure why legislation is required to inform companies that calling someone's cell phone twice a day is inappropriate, but it sure seems like Comcast hasn't given up on its dedicated aims to treating the public like shit now that the merger-dream is over.

Filed Under: customer service, kia elder, robocalls
Companies: comcast