NFL free agency can be pricey, and that’s before you factor in the cost of keeping fans abreast of the latest news regarding their favorite teams.
The Bills will pay up to $3 million — mostly in debit cards that can only be used at their team store — to settle a class-action lawsuit that accused them of sending too many text-message alerts to fans who signed up for the service.
Bills fan and Florida resident Jerry Wojcik alleged the team violated the terms of its text service by sending him 13 messages over a two-week span when it promised to sent no more than five per week.
Silly as it sounds, a settlement was filed last week in federal court in Tampa, Fla., in which the Bills agreed to provide up to $2.5 million in debit cards to people who had signed up for the text service, along with $562,500 to Wojcik’s lawyers and $5,000 in cash to Wojcik.
The fans who received more than five text message alerts in a week will be given a total of $2,497,745 in the form of debit cards. They can be used at the Bills store at Ralph Wilson Stadium in Orchard Park or online at the team’s website. They can’t be converted into cash.
The cards are worth $57.50, $65 or $75, depending on which tier a fan is assigned to, and the Bills said in a legal filing that an estimated 39,750 phone numbers had been registered through the now-defunct text-messaging service. As part of the settlement, the Bills promised to put in “safeguards” to ensure any new service abides by limits set by the team on the number of messages.