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AT&T Revamps Throttling Policy, Only Slows Unlimited Users above 3GB/Month

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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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AT&T is retooling its throttling policy with regards to users with unlimited data plans, originally implemented last year. Instead of throttling customers on a case-by-case basis, users are going to be slowed after a fixed amount of data usage each month.

3G/HSPA+ users with unlimited data plans will be slowed after 3GB of data usage, while 4G/LTE users will be slowed after 5GB each month. AT&T spokesperson Seth Bloom gave MacRumors this statement:
With mobile data usage continuing to skyrocket and the availability of spectrum scarce, AT&T, like other wireless companies, manages its network in the most fair way possible so that we can provide the best possible mobile broadband experience for all our customers.

How we're managing the network only affects a small minority of the heaviest smartphone data users still on unlimited plans. Put another way, this does not impact more than 95 percent of our smartphone customers.

Even with reduced data speeds, these customers will still be able to email and surf the web, and continue to use an unlimited amount of data each month.

The reason reduced speeds only apply to unlimited smartphone customers is because their data usage is significantly higher than those on tiered plans. For example, in January, the top 5 percent of our unlimited data plan customers used an average of over 50 percent more data than the top 5 percent of customers on tiered plans.

Because spectrum is limited and data usage continues to soar, we manage our network this way to be as fair as possible and so we can provide the best possible mobile broadband experience to everyone.
We encourage all of our customers to use Wi-Fi whenever possible - especially when watching video, which is the most data-intensive activity.
Click to expand...
AT&T has set up a special website focused on the changes. An extremely heavy user in California recently took AT&T to small claims court over the throttling of his "unlimited" data plan and won a $850 judgement.

Some users had reported getting throttled after as little as 1.5 or 2GB of monthly usage, so the bump to 3GB is a significant increase for them. It also offers the same amount of full-speed data usage, for the same price, as the current metered offering. Both the old "unlimited" data plan and the current 3GB data plan cost $30/month.

Other users have recently reported seeing more usable data speeds after being throttled, allowing them to email and surf the web at a more reasonable speed than was originally being provided.

Article Link: AT&T Revamps Throttling Policy, Only Slows Unlimited Users above 3GB/Month
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/03/01/att-revamps-throttling-policy-only-slows-unlimited-users-above-3gbmonth/
T

troop231

macrumors 603
Jan 20, 2010
5,822
553
ATT really just needs to focus on expanding their network, 2013 full LTE rollout can't come soon enough!
 
O

Optheduim

macrumors regular
Jun 9, 2011
196
279
NYC
As an unlimited user I still find that annoying. yeah 3gb is the same price as unlimited, but I have unlimited. At least treat me with the respect of a little bit of a perk... throttle at 3.25gb just to honor the title of 'unlimited'!
 
A

Ant.honey

macrumors regular
Oct 14, 2008
228
45
New York City
Unlimited is just that, unlimited. I will sue for any throttling at all. The company is bad enough without trying to pull this crap.
 
slu

slu

macrumors 68000
Sep 15, 2004
1,636
107
Buffalo
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

Fine. But this still gives me no reason to switch to a tiered plan since it costs the same. It does give a reason to switch to sprint though.
 
iPhD

iPhD

macrumors member
Jun 22, 2007
66
64
"Some users have recently reported seeing more usable data speeds after being throttled, allowing them to email and surf the web at a more reasonable speed than was originally being provided."

What does that even mean? After the individual user's speed was throttled he had a better surfing experience because it was slower? That seems strange.
 
WildCowboy

WildCowboy

Administrator/Editor
Staff member
Jan 20, 2005
18,390
2,825
iPhD said:
"Some users have recently reported seeing more usable data speeds after being throttled, allowing them to email and surf the web at a more reasonable speed than was originally being provided."

What does that even mean? After the individual user's speed was throttled he had a better surfing experience because it was slower? That seems strange.
Click to expand...

The "throttled" speed seems to be a bit higher than it used to be. Before it was almost unusable when throttled. Now it's just bad...usable, but bad.

Neither compares to the unthrottled 3G speeds.
 
G

ghostalker

macrumors newbie
Nov 4, 2008
19
0
"Put another way, this does not impact more than 95 percent of our smartphone customers."

Do you think they meant for it to come out that way?
 
SkyBell

SkyBell

macrumors 604
Sep 7, 2006
6,603
219
Texas, unfortunately.
iPhD said:
"Some users have recently reported seeing more usable data speeds after being throttled, allowing them to email and surf the web at a more reasonable speed than was originally being provided."

What does that even mean? After the individual user's speed was throttled he had a better surfing experience because it was slower? That seems strange.
Click to expand...

I would suppose it means the slowdown after being throttled isn't as bad as it once was.
 
Y

Yodalogger

macrumors member
Oct 18, 2005
41
7
St. Louis MO
So I can keep my unlimited plan and get throttled or switch to tiered plan pay extra for non-throttled overage data.

How about I give you the finger and switch. I didn't see that on the special website outlining my options.
 
W

Wxturtle

macrumors newbie
Jan 27, 2009
7
0
AT&T's official solution. Option #3.

If you are getting throttled at 3 GB on your unlimited plan, you can choose to switch to our tiered 3 GB data plan.

This will cost you exactly the same, but instead of throttling you, we'll just charge you overage fees!

LOL.
 
A

Andronicus

macrumors 6502a
Apr 1, 2008
819
817
Step in the right direction...

"Other users have recently reported seeing more usable data speeds after being throttled, allowing them to email and surf the web at a more reasonable speed than was originally being provided."

I have noticed this too. I'm throttled every month and it used to be once I was throttled I was only getting 0.11Mbps down, but now I'm noticing when I'm throttled I get around .22Mbps.
 
spiderman0616

spiderman0616

Suspended
Aug 1, 2010
5,668
7,490
How convenient:

They're making it appear that they're relaxing their throttling policy, but really they're just changing it to match the currently available data plan. I don't think you can get the 2 GB data plan anymore, so they're just reflecting that change.

What a bunch of crooks.
 
R

Ryth

macrumors 68000
Apr 21, 2011
1,591
157
I wish Apple would take some of that billions and just buy their own wireless spectrum....
 
ftaok

ftaok

macrumors 603
Jan 23, 2002
6,486
1,571
East Coast
Throttling at 3GB/mo for 3G/HSPA+ users and 5GB/mo for 4G/LTE users seems like a bit of an F-U for iPhone users. Since most AT&T smartphone users are iPhone users and all iPhones are on 3G (or slower).
 
C

claygreenberg

macrumors member
Feb 26, 2009
32
0
ghostalker said:
"Put another way, this does not impact more than 95 percent of our smartphone customers."

Do you think they meant for it to come out that way?
Click to expand...

Yeah, either Seth Bloom is an idiot who needs to take a writing course, or that was a very deliberate move to phrase something in an ambiguous fashion. The most natural way to interpret that sentence is: "At most, this impacts 95 percent of our smartphone customers." What he should have said (if he wanted to be clear and trustworthy: "Put another way, this impacts no more than 5 percent of our customers."
 
H

HelveticaRoman

macrumors 6502
Jun 28, 2011
258
0
If their definition of unlimited is spelt "unlimited", can't we use the same elastic interpretation for "Total amount" when we pay their bills.
 
dokujaryu

dokujaryu

macrumors 6502
May 3, 2011
359
12
Irvine, California
I mean, it was pretty obvious they were going to do this. What was it, around 50% of iPhone / iPad users are unlimited?


Attention AT&T unlimited customers! You will be throttled!
tumblr_lelb4jqGfJ1qbbwbf.jpg
 
Chupa Chupa

Chupa Chupa

macrumors G5
Jul 16, 2002
14,835
7,396
MacRumors said:
3G/HSPA+ users with unlimited data plans will be slowed after 3GB of data usage, while 4G/LTE users will be slowed after 5GB each month.
Click to expand...

The LTE part is interesting. When the iPad and iPhone go LTE am I to understand the ceiling will be 5GB before throttling? I think I'd be pretty happy about that but one question: is there anything inherent about LTE that causes data to be used faster? Logically it seems, for example, the data rate of any given steaming video would be constant whether it's being kicked via 3G or 4G.
 
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