For almost a year, the government has been looking into the "mystery fees" that Verizon now admits it mistakenly charged millions of customers. Verizon has finally fessed up to the snafu, and it has agreed to refund tens of millions of dollars to consumers.

"We can confirm reports of an FCC investigation into mystery fees that appeared on Verizon Wireless bills costing over 15 million Americans tens of millions of dollars," declared Federal Communications Commission Enforcement Bureau Chief Michele Ellison, in a statement sent to us on Sunday evening.

But the refunds have been a long time coming: "Questions remain as to why it took Verizon two years to reimburse its customers and why greater disclosure and other corrective actions did not come much, much sooner."

A fraction thereof

The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription) that Verizon will reimburse millions of customers for data plan service charges they didn't initiate. The total refunds could come to $50 million, although most consumers will see reimbursements to the tune of something between two and six bucks credited to their bills (or, if they're no longer customers, sent by check).

Some of these accidental charges involved application demonstrations preloaded on their mobiles, the WSJ discloses. Others involved fees incurred after users launched Verizon's Mobile Web browser.

As we reported, last December the FCC launched a probe into Verizon's jumbo-sized early termination fees, but it also had concerns about about the Mobile Web feature, which comes with a usage fee. The service offers something like what you get from a free Google account—e-mail, news, weather, sports—but it features a stiff usage rate. If you don't subscribe to a prepaid or unlimited data bundle, the cost at that time was $1.99 per megabyte or a "fraction thereof," as VZ put it, of monthly data use.

Here's how Verizon described Mobile Web to the Commission:

Usage fees for Verizon Wireless' mobile Internet service, Mobile Web, apply when a customer launches the Internet browser and then navigates away from the default Mobile Web homepage to sites other than a Verizon Wireless customer care site (e.g., My Verizon, the online customer account portal). Usage fees are not charged when a customer simply launches the Internet browser and lands on the Verizon Wireless Mobile Web homepage, which is the default setting. Most devices sold today have a default setting so that when the Internet browser is activated it will immediately link to the Mobile Web homepage (which, as indicated above, would not cause a customer to incur a fee). Where available, this link is usually on the main menu of the device for convenience since it is a commonly used application, or is accessed by pressing a 'fourway' navigation key on the device. The location of the browser link has varied over the past ten years and on hundreds of Mobile Web capable devices, and is not always configurable from the main menu.

But in response to news reports critical of the service, the FCC asked Verizon: "Is it correct that customers are charged for minimal, accidental usage by customers using these phones?"

If it ends there

Verizon responded that the answer was no—sort of. Non-prepaid or data plan customers who navigated to Mobile Web's home page were not charged. "If the browsing session ends there without the customer navigating to another webpage," Verizon explained, "the customer will not incur charges for Mobile Web browsing."

But it looks like some did incur a fee or two, after all. "They weren't supposed to be charged, but the software dinged them anyway," an unnamed person described by the WSJ as "a person familiar with the matter" explained.

The FCC "will continue to explore these issues," the FCC's Ellison says, "including the possibility of additional penalties, to ensure that all companies prioritize the interests of consumers when billing problems occur."

Listing image by Bernie Goldbach