The Truth-In-Billing, Remedies, and User Empowerment over Fees Act
[TRUE Fees] has been introduced by Rep Anna Eshoo [D-CA] and Sen Ed
Markey [D-MA]; if passed, it will force ISPs and cable operators to
advertise the true costs of their packages, including all surcharges.
As Karl Bode writes on Motherboard, the bill seeks to remedy an epidemic
of the kind of false advertising that is banned in Europe, but which
American firms regard as “the height of capitalistic creativity,” from
hotels who use hidden “resort fees” to jack up prices over advertised
rates to the misleading “regulatory recovery” fees on phone or utility
bills that falsely suggest that they are the result of some statute, not
the company’s greed.
And of course, no one practices this deceptive art with the virtuosity
of the cable/ISP industry, whose monopolism, contempt for customers, and
price gouging are legendary.
