AT&T's Grandfathered Unlimited Data Plan Customers Get 5GB on LTE Before Being Throttled

I wonder if they'll allow me to use my iphone as a hotspot under the unlimited plan. I couldn't care less about facetime. 5gb before throttling sounds good to me considering $30 doesn't buy you 5gb of LTE data.

(edit) to add to my confusion "is eligible for an upgrade at full retail price."

So I can get the $199 phone or do I have to pay $449 or some other price?

I have an unlimited plan with ATT, i'd rather have 5 gigs of usable data. Both of our ATT's phones are borderline useless and all att can say is that they plan to "upgrade the towers in 60 - 90 days in my area".

maniaco007 said:

It's incredible that plans in the USA are around $100/month.

Here in france, we have unlimited plans (talk/txt/data) for €20/month. That's UNLIMITED on 3G and now LTE all over the country, great coverage, etc... From ALL carriers!!!

Something's wrong in the US!

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Straighttalk in the USA $45/month unlimited talk/txt/data. Why anyone forks over their hard earned money to this despicable company is beyond me.

Carlanga said:

WoW, I'm REALLY surprised w/ AT&T's decision positively.

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Verizon's advertising strategy is eve worse, I can't count how many FiOS ads they have deep in AT&T territory which they don't provide FiOS.

Switched to Straight Talk form AT&T and will never look back.

Buying the unlocked iPhone 5 when they offer it and when ST offers nano sims.

AT&T can kiss my @ss.

So let's do the math here.

I'm eligible for a partial early upgrade. So iPhone 5 64GB upgrade cost = $649.

To cancel my current contract. Pay the cancellation fee of $325 - $120 ($10 off each month full filled) Brings the cancellation fee to $205.

To get open up a new iPhone 5 64GB it would cost $399.00.

So really I could be looking at paying $624.00.

Partial Upgrade Discount = My @sshole = Full of *****.

and for all you out there that keep saying "you signed the contract", "you need to honor what you signed - they did" blah blah blah. You're just as fake as the crap you write. AT&T has benefitted tremendously from iPhone users. My biggest issue is them controlling how we can and cannot user our data plans. If I pay for 5GB of data, I should be able to use FaceTime, Hotspot and other features they don't allow. Even on unlimited data plans - they throttle after 3GB - I'm fine with that - however don't limit what and how I want to use my data. Let me use my 3GB and throttle me for the remaining month - that's fair. So AT&T can kiss it.

The least they can do now, is give me the dam phone if they're going to limit how my data usage is used.

Gemütlichkeit said:

Switched to Straight Talk form AT&T and will never look back.

Buying the unlocked iPhone 5 when they offer it and when ST offers nano sims.

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Same here

fantastic news!!!

Mr Fusion said:

No you'll use more data. You'll end up browsing more because you'll have more time to do it since you won't spend as much time waiting for pages to load. (But to be fair, browsing doesn't eat up as much data as streaming videos, which you can't consume faster.)

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WOW. Can I have some of what you're smoking??

Well, given that I was expecting AT&T to force me to give up my unlimited data plan and select a limited data plan anyway, this news seems pretty reasonable to me. Currently I pay $30/mo for unlimited data and was going to go for 3GB @ $30 under the limited plan. So now it looks like I'll be getting an extra 2GB for (hopefully) the same price, albeit with the caveat of no FaceTime over cellular, which is no big deal for me.

wow!

Wow! I wasn't expecting this at all. I was just doing the math on canceling my contract etc. but now that I've seen this I have to reconsider. With a 16% discount and unlimited data I may have to stick with AT&T ****** service and hope there 4G LTE rollout doesn't take forever. I'm in Philly which I believe will be lit with LTE soon.

rugbydevildog said:

So let's do the math here.

I'm eligible for a partial early upgrade. So iPhone 5 64GB upgrade cost = $649.

To cancel my current contract. Pay the cancellation fee of $325 - $120 ($10 off each month full filled) Brings the cancellation fee to $205.

To get open up a new iPhone 5 64GB it would cost $399.00.

So really I could be looking at paying $624.00.

Partial Upgrade Discount = My @sshole = Full of *****.

and for all you out there that keep saying "you signed the contract", "you need to honor what you signed - they did" blah blah blah. You're just as fake as the crap you write. AT&T has benefitted tremendously from iPhone users. My biggest issue is them controlling how we can and cannot user our data plans. If I pay for 5GB of data, I should be able to use FaceTime, Hotspot and other features they don't allow. Even on unlimited data plans - they throttle after 3GB - I'm fine with that - however don't limit what and how I want to use my data. Let me use my 3GB and throttle me for the remaining month - that's fair. So AT&T can kiss it.

The least they can do now, is give me the dam phone if they're going to limit how my data usage is used.

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You would still need to pay the $36 activation fee if you were to do that. So $624+$36 = $660

blacktape242 said:

I hate ATT

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Come to Europe LTE for real and you don't get to pay for receiving calls/texts (I still need an explanation for this... it is as if you were charged for being born).

Wait, why does this article mention you can pre-order a 16 GB iPhone 5 specifically? Can't we also pre-order a 32 or 64 GB iPhone 5 if desired???

I don't know about everyone here, but I have never even used FaceTime. It upsets you guys this much that you would switch carriers just to use it over LTE?

maniaco007 said:

It's incredible that plans in the USA are around $100/month.

Here in france, we have unlimited plans (talk/txt/data) for €20/month. That's UNLIMITED on 3G and now LTE all over the country, great coverage, etc... From ALL carriers!!!

Something's wrong in the US!

Click to expand...

It's more that the USA is huge. I live in Texas, and our state is bigger than France in sq km, so it costs more to set up towers all over the countryside. Plus, the US has much larger geographic differences. It costs a ton to build networks out in the Rockys....

I raised your hand if you only used FaceTime the 1st week of having your new iPhone and then never used it again? **raises hand**

maniaco007 said:

It's incredible that plans in the USA are around $100/month.

Here in france, we have unlimited plans (talk/txt/data) for €20/month. That's UNLIMITED on 3G and now LTE all over the country, great coverage, etc... From ALL carriers!!!

Something's wrong in the US!

Click to expand...

While nobody will argue that US companies aren't more greedy, I wouldn't closely compare US carriers to individual EU nation carriers. US carriers support a contiguous state population of less than 5x that of Metropolitan France, but a land area of 15x! Huge infrastructure difference.

nottooshabby said:

Hmmmm....I was all geared up to switch to verizon thinking I was going to have to change to a more expensive plan on ATT.

2 iPhones on verizon sharing 4GB of data would be $150+tax plus you get the mobile hotspot included. Also includes unlimited voice and texting. Verizon shows LTE coverage all over portland, oR.

Right now I pay $115 w/ my work 18% discount including taxes on ATT with 2 iPhones, unlimited data, 700 shared minutes which we never use, but no unlimited texting and no mobile hotspot . But data speeds are horrible at my work on ATT, like dial up speeds, but is it worth spending another $50 a month on verizon? No LTE service up here in Portland either on ATT...hmmmm

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According to emails from AT&T, they are turning up LTE in Portland by the end of the year along with 46 other cities.

Dumped 'unlimited' for Hotspot. Glad I did. Use it often. Shared data gives us plenty so far.

jlasoon said:

Straighttalk in the USA $45/month unlimited talk/txt/data. Why anyone forks over their hard earned money to this despicable company is beyond me.

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actually for family plans, post paid (non shared data plans) comes out ahead as a better deal when factoring in the subsidies. otherwise, for individual plans it makes sense to go prepaid

Say what?

"Additionally, unlike Verizon, which is no longer offering unlimited data customers discounted pricing on new handsets -- even with a new, two-year contract -- AT&T will honor its subsidized pricing policies even for its customers with unlimited data plans."

Would someone interpret this for me?

Does this mean that ATT will waive prior two year commitment on upgrade?

So is there a risk when upgrading through Apple when I preorder this Friday? I assume the option will be there to keep unlimited and I will not have to contact AT&T correct?

Dumb question. I have the 4 and ATT voice coverage is so bad in San Francisco that I can't even talk in my house. Will any of the updated data radios in the iPhone 5 help with voice coverage?
My wife has the Verizon 4S and it works well all over the bay area. I was going to switch but if they are going to give me 5GB for <$65 on my corp account then I might stay.

gt1948 said:

"Additionally, unlike Verizon, which is no longer offering unlimited data customers discounted pricing on new handsets -- even with a new, two-year contract -- AT&T will honor its subsidized pricing policies even for its customers with unlimited data plans."

Would someone interpret this for me?

Does this mean that ATT will waive prior two year commitment on upgrade?

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This means that unlike Verizon, AT&T won't force you to pay full price in order to keep your unlimited data plan.

Which I was prepared to do, but yay! Now I don't have to.