Microsoft Corp. has been sued in the U.K. over the way it licenses its software to customers of rival cloud providers. 

Maria Luisa Stasi, a market regulation expert, filed the complaint today with the U.K.’s Competition Appeal Tribunal. The class-action lawsuit is seeking £1 billion, or about $1.25 billion, in damages from Microsoft on behalf  of thousands of customers. It’s the latest in a series of recent class-action complaints brought against tech giants by U.K. users.

The new lawsuit alleges that Microsoft has overcharged customers who run its software on competing cloud platforms such as Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Alibaba Cloud. The complaint places particular emphasis on the company’s Windows Server operating system. 

Windows Server is a version of Windows geared towards on-premises servers and cloud instances. It includes an array of features not included in the desktop version, including tools for managing containers and troubleshooting network issues. There are also cybersecurity capabilities that ease tasks such as managing passwords. 

In 2019, Microsoft changed the way it licenses Windows Server to cloud customers. The company introduced terms that require organizations to pay additional fees if they move Windows Server licenses from Azure to rival platforms. According to Google LLC, those fees increase the cost of running the software on competing cloud platforms by up to 400%.

Last year, the search giant asked the U.K.’s antitrust regulator to order that Microsoft change its software licensing practices. It has also filed an antitrust complaint over the matter with the European Commission.

CISPE, a trade association that represents cloud providers in the European Union, filed a similar complaint in 2022. This past July, the group withdrew the filing earlier after inking an agreement with Microsoft. The company has reportedly agreed to pay CISPE members $22 million to compensate them for certain software licensing costs. 

“Microsoft is punishing U.K. businesses and organisations for using Google, Amazon and Alibaba for cloud computing by forcing them to pay more money for Windows Server,” Luisa Stasi said in a statement. 

The lawsuit has two main goals. The first is to uncover the extent to which U.K. users were overcharged as a result of Microsoft’s licensing practices. Second, the complaint is asking the Competition Appeal Tribunal to require that Microsoft reimburse affected organizations. 

The lawsuit has an opt-out structure, which means Microsoft customers are automatically represented in the litigation. They will receive a portion of any damages the company may be ordered to pay unless they indicate they don’t wish to participate. 

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