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U.S. Gov Says Sprint Overcharged for Wiretaps

Mar 4, 2014, 7:45 AM by Eric M. Zeman

The U.S. government has filed a lawsuit against Sprint, alleging the company overcharged for wiretapping services by $21 million. Carriers are required to assist the government and must maintain certain types of equipment to do so. Carriers are allowed to bill the government for the upkeep of that equipment. In this particular case, San Francisco U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag is charging Sprint with filing false claims during the period between January 2007 and July 2007, inflating costs by as much as 58%. Carriers are not allowed to use the maintenance money to improve their network or other equipment. "Because Sprint's invoices for intercept charges did not identify the particular expenses for which it sought reimbursement, federal law enforcement agencies were unable to detect that Sprint was requesting reimbursement of these unallowable costs," said the government. Sprint denies the charges and says all its invoices comply with the law. It will defend itself vigorously. Sprint is also facing a separate tax case in New York state, where the state says Sprint failed to collect enough taxes from customers.

Reuters »

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Colombianmax

Mar 4, 2014, 9:26 AM

Uncle Sam is after Sprint!

The other day I read that Sprint owed a couple mil in taxes and now this? They're just in big twouble with the government aren't they?

I wonder if stuff like this will also add on to the list of negatives of a Sprint/T-Mobile merger aside from the reduced competition in the market.

What do you guys think?

crossedsignals

Both the New York sales tax case and this case cite violation of False Claims Acts (in the case of the NY case, it's the state law, in this case it's federal law).

I can tell you first hand that when dealing with the government, state or federal, i...
(continues)

Funonewi

I had sprint at that time, they over billed me many times. One month my bill would be $30 more, when you called them they would deny, but they could not justify it. Will never go back to Sprint again.

...

amarryat

Mar 4, 2014, 9:00 AM

What's a few dollars

Isn't this the government that pays $750 for a toilet seat?

Tofuchong

They just placed an order for 28000 toilet seats. Gotta get that 21 mil from somewhere!

Slammer

Mar 4, 2014, 8:10 AM

Strange.

I don't have all the info to agree or disagree here. However, I'm going off the cuff to say that Sprint needs to be padding the government with more pac money such as VZW and AT&T do.

A squeaky wheel gets the grease.

John B.

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