AT&T brings customer’s throttling dispute to an end with $850 payout

AT&T’s back-and-forth with Matt Spaccarelli, the customer that took the carrier to small claims court for its throttling practices on unlimited data plans, appears to be over. AP reports that the carrier sent Spaccarelli a check for $850 — along with $85 for court fees — in compliance with the court ruling in February. You may recall that the carrier initially wanted to settle with Spaccarelli under the terms of a non-disclosure agreement, something he was unwilling to do, and the carrier seems to have decided to simply pay him as ordered.

This doesn’t mean the issue as a whole is over for AT&T, however. The carrier doesn’t allow its customers to take it to jury trials or join class action lawsuits — a stance upheld by the Supreme Court last year — leaving only small claims court and arbitration as venues to redress any grievances. With Spaccerelli’s win, other customers may feel emboldened to take similar courses of action, and with no NDA binding him, Spaccerelli will be able to detail exactly how he won his case. For his part, Spaccarelli has always insisted that his real goal was to simply get true unlimited data for the unlimited plan price, but it looks like the settlement — and a raised throttling threshold — will have to do.