DENVER (Legal Newsline) - Colorado Attorney General John Suthers announced on Monday that his office has reached an agreement with Office Depot to resolve allegations that it overbilled government and nonprofit entities.
The settlement, known as an assurance of discontinuance and voluntary compliance, will offer a refund to the approximately 115 Colorado governmental agencies and nonprofits connected with the sale of office supplies between January 2006 and March 2009. As part of the agreement, Office Depot will refund those Colorado customers up to $189,000.
Suthers alleges that the customers were put on a higher-cost price plan without their knowledge or without complete information about the cost differences between price plans that were available to the customers. The customers allegedly paid a total of $126,294.04 more than they would have on a lower-cost price plan.
A total of $222,561.94 of the $412,000 settlement will be held by Suthers' office in a trust to reimburse the state for attorney fees, actual costs and for consumer education, consumer fraud or antitrust enforcement actions.
Office Depot denied any wrongdoing and fully cooperated with Suthers' office.
"I appreciate Office Depot's willingness to work through these issues with my office," Suthers said.