AT&T says Metered Cell Phone Data Plans are Inevitable

[radioouman]

Why aren't you guys complaining about voice minutes or about text messaging plans? Those services are already tiered and most consumers are duped into thinking that they need the extra messages or minutes "just in case". The same is true with data.

I love my data plan and I use it quite a bit. But add up all of my podcast downloads, web browsing, MP3 downloads, Google Maps, Slingbox and internet radio and I am using 3 gig per month at most.

 

[hanoverphist]

"Hey guys, lets charge more for poorer service!"

What other industries does this happen in? :|

cable internet, cable tv, electric power, online distribution, the list can go on forever. everyone wants to pay less and get more, every company wants to charge more and offer less. my cable company sent me a letter telling me i was "upgraded" to their premier package at no cost. my bill went up 15 bucks. weird thing is, the burst is a bit faster but the averae speed is 3mb lower than it was when i was on their "preferred" tier. overall, im paying more for less. i tell them that and they tell me my hardware is outdated and slowing my connection down. despite the fact that the numbers coincide with them upgrading me for free.


cell phone minutes, text and data pisses me off more than any of them tho, but theres not much i can do beyond bitch at them about it. well, i can bitch about it here too, but it has even less effect.

 

[Wonderful Pork]

I'm all for metering as long as it's fair and not stacked in the carriers favor. They seem to be pleased with $30/5GB which is about $.006/Meg.

If they had a $5+.01/Meg I'd be all over it, my family plan would drop by like $50/month.

Of course that will never happen, look how they are now requiring $10/mo data plans on QWERTY/messaging phones now to drive up revenue.

 

[AstroManLuca]

For now that's just Verizon, and even they have a few QWERTY phones that don't require a data plan. The sucky thing is that every phone with even middling data capabilities is forced into the exact same data plan. I would welcome a reasonable set of tiers for data.

As it is now, Verizon's $10 for 25 MB that they require for "3G multimedia phones" is an insultingly blatant money-grab. The plan is required for phones that can hardly use it, and such a low limit virtually ensures overages if you try. Meanwhile, there's no point to getting a "low-end" smartphone since you need the same plan and the cost of the data over 2 years far outweighs the savings of getting a free feature phone instead of, say, a Droid.

 

[shortylickens]

If this is successful with AT&T then it will come to Verizon eventually. Provided they have a reasonable price for unlimited data, I've got no issue with this. I do lots of surfing and such on my Android.

 

[dguy6789]

Just going to point out that T-Mobile's data plan has a 10GB soft cap for the same price as the other companies' 5GB plans.

 

[shortylickens]

Just going to point out that T-Mobile's data plan has a 10GB soft cap for the same price as the other companies' 5GB plans.

Yeah but at 1X speed how long do you think it would take to hit that?

 

[dguy6789]

Yeah but at 1X speed how long do you think it would take to hit that?

1mbps?

 

[BigDaddyD]

I would just like to say that ATT has never had a problem not refunding my monthly charges for all of the talk time I don't use or all of the data I don't use every month...which is prob 90% of both every month ever since I have had my contract...and it has been up for a long time. I very rarely use my phone, because I simply hate their service. I had a few iphones that never worked...and made me never want to make a call so I just text and now I use a motorola global q, which sounds good but sucks at everything else. Needless to say, I don't think they should do this. They have no problem sucking us dry.

 

[lupi]

There is nothing wrong with tiered offerings. Both the user and the carrier wins. Low data users pay less and reduce their costs while power users get all the data they want by paying for it. I have no issue with it.

Disclosure: I haven't paid a cell phone bill since 2002, all my BlackBerry calls, texts and unlimited data, and my 3G laptop Dongle, are all paid for by my employer.

you're also not dealing with US price plans/points.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

you're also not dealing with US price plans/points.

Perhaps, but $30 for 5gb is inline with what the rest of the world is paying.... Ask UK users on O2, Vodafone and Orange. It's about that much...