AT&T Wages Quiet War on Grandfathered Unlimited Users

[Poke]

Typical AT&T..

AT&T Wages Quiet War on Grandfathered Unlimited Users - 2GB Throttle Not So Subtly Pushing Users Toward Meters | DSLReports.com, ISP Information

 

[DodgerKing]

This is what I believe has been the issue all along.

In other words, pay $30 for "unlimited" service where you're actually only getting 2 GB of data before your phone becomes useless, or sign up for a 3GB tier for the same price so you're in line to get socked with the usage overages of tomorrow.

It has nothing to do with the top 5% as I doubt the top 5% threshold is 2GB. I am sure it is quite higher. It has to do with them attempting to make people pay the same or more for less.

 

[steve4810]

My Verizon plan includes a grandfathered unlimited data for $29.99 and if want change I can get 2GB for $30, 5GB for $50 or 10GB for $80.

 

[riffjim4069]

Well, as much as I like Verizon's reliability, I think I'll keep my Sprint Plan for at least another year.

Sent from my HTC EVO using SatelliteGuys App

 

[steve4810]

Well, as much as I like Verizon's reliability, I think I'll keep my Sprint Plan for at least another year.

Sent from my HTC EVO using SatelliteGuys App

I was complaining more than bragging.

 

[mcintire123]

The unlimited plan worked good to get new customers on board. Now that they got the customers into a nice 2 year contract they can change things around so they can start making money and stop maxing out their network... Brilliant plan for the accountants...

 

[steve4810]

Brilliant plan for the accountants...

Yup I think it's brilliant!

 

[rockymtnhigh]

This is what I believe has been the issue all along.

It has nothing to do with the top 5% as I doubt the top 5% threshold is 2GB. I am sure it is quite higher. It has to do with them attempting to make people pay the same or more for less.

One of my students got the five percent email, and all he used was 2gb.

Sent from my iPad using SatelliteGuys

 

[DodgerKing]

One of my students got the five percent email, and all he used was 2gb.

Sent from my iPad using SatelliteGuys

I got it as well for using 2.1GB. I doubt the 5% mark is at 2GB. I think they are making it up and using the 2GB mark because it is right below the 3GB plan for the same price. I believe this is a way for them to get the unlimited users whom use just less than 3GB to switch over to a limited plan for the same price.

 

[JAG72]

For those that have received the message did you start getting throttled? If you did what were your speeds like?

 

[DodgerKing]

For those that have received the message did you start getting throttled? If you did what were your speeds like?

Honestly, I don't know.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Like I've mentioned before, I've used TONS of data and have never received anything resembling a warning or anything. I thought I may have been throttled earlier in the month but it turned out my phone didn't work well with the Rogers radio file (installed to allow for switching over to EDGE network to save battery life.) I have made some efforts to reduce my data usage, the main one being that I am no longer streaming SiriusXM for nearly 8 hours a day, 5 days a week on my phone. But this is my past data usage:

1GB, 5GB, 3.4GB, 4.9GB, 5.3GB, 8.6GB, ~6GB (I'm guesstimating because AT&T won't tell me for some reason.)

So I've either fallen off the radar for some reason, or if they are really basing it off the top 5% of the area, I can only imagine what sort of data usage is around me.. Oh and they still haven't detected that I have been using WiFi Tethering, but to be fair I only use that in an absolute emergency.

 

[StevenD]

Like I've mentioned before, I've used TONS of data and have never received anything resembling a warning or anything. I thought I may have been throttled earlier in the month but it turned out my phone didn't work well with the Rogers radio file (installed to allow for switching over to EDGE network to save battery life.) I have made some efforts to reduce my data usage, the main one being that I am no longer streaming SiriusXM for nearly 8 hours a day, 5 days a week on my phone. But this is my past data usage:

1GB, 5GB, 3.4GB, 4.9GB, 5.3GB, 8.6GB, ~6GB (I'm guesstimating because AT&T won't tell me for some reason.)

So I've either fallen off the radar for some reason, or if they are really basing it off the top 5% of the area, I can only imagine what sort of data usage is around me.. Oh and they still haven't detected that I have been using WiFi Tethering, but to be fair I only use that in an absolute emergency.

They will find you eventually. I believe they are targeting certain markets right now. They removed my "Unlimited" plan and put me on a DataPro plan. They caught me tethering and so I really couldn't argue with the move, since I was, technically, violating their TOS.

I received the "Top 5%" message last month the same day I hit 2GB. In the past, I have used almost 10GB and was never warned. I was also told they probably wouldn't mess with me since I'm on a large corporate account, but that proved to not be the case.

I have an LTE phone, so I can burn through some data pretty quickly.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Something tells me that once LTE comes into my market that things will become more stringent. Reading all these reports of throttling, one of the common themes appears to be customers in larger markets, while mine is rather small (relatively speaking.)

As far as the punishing for tethering goes, don't they give you some sort of warning first, or do they just say "Okay, now you've lost your unlimited plan" and switch you? That sounds a little screwed up that they can just switch your plan without your permission. I mean I can understand if they sent me a warning and I continued to do it, but just for one time?

 

[truckracer]

i got the text msg at 2.6 gb. i know it is prob not a better service but i am strongly considering virgin mobile 45.00 plan with their android motorola triumph. a lot of people here have virgin data and it works well over the sprint network.

 

[steve4810]

They caught me tethering and so I really couldn't argue with the move, since I was, technically, violating their TOS.

I've only experimented with tethering just to see if i could. But now that I am LTE I'm thinking I might use it on weekends in L.A. because it's faster than the Hotel Wifi(which sometimes doesn't work at all). The question is how can someone be caught tethering?

 

[mike123abc]

Over on DSL reports there seems to be indications that it depends where you are in the country as to where AT&T throttles you. Some areas do not seem to see any limit, other areas get hit at 2GB, 3GB, 5GB, 10GB, etc. So, it could be that they have been cranking down the cap in areas that are overloaded.

 

[mike123abc]

I've only experimented with tethering just to see if i could. But now that I am LTE I'm thinking I might use it on weekends in L.A. because it's faster than the Hotel Wifi(which sometimes doesn't work at all). The question is how can someone be caught tethering?

They say that the phone requests a second IP address for tethering and that is how they detect it.

 

[StevenD]

They say that the phone requests a second IP address for tethering and that is how they detect it.

They also can tell which browser you are using when querying a web page. Obviously, if you are on an iPhone, they expect yo to use Safari mobile. If they see you are using IE or Firefox, then you certainly arent using the phones browser.

 

[navychop]

I thought there was a Chrome or FF for the iPhone, no?