Amaysim Australia and Lycamobile have each paid a total of AU$126,000 in penalties after the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) issued the mobile service providers with infringement notices for alleged false or misleading representations about their mobile phone plans.
The consumer watchdog alleges that each business separately advertised on social media that their mobile phone plans were offering "unlimited" data to consumers on social media, when in fact each of their plans had a maximum data allowance. For those plans, if customers exceeded those capped amounts, they would be subject to additional charges, according to the ACCC.
The ACCC alleges the messaging on the ads were a breach of Australian Consumer Law and likely misled consumers.
"Consumers who saw the word 'unlimited' in the advertisements without any explanation of the limits of the plans were likely to expect they would not be charged additional fees for mobile data, no matter how much data they used," ACCC chair Rod Sims said.
"The telco industry has been previously put on notice that their advertisements must be clear and transparent, and must not contain claims like 'unlimited' without a clear and prominent disclosure of any qualification or exception which applies to the offer."
This is not the first time the companies have landed in hot water with the ACCC for misleading conduct.
The ACCC took legal action against Amaysim[1] two years ago on claims that the company made false and misleading ads about discounts on the company's energy brand, Click Energy. At the time, the ACCC described Click Energy's advertising as being "among the worst practices" it had seen in retail electricity.
Lycamobile has also been fined previously for failing to comply[2] with the Telecommunications Consumer Protections Code.
In 2018, the