AT&T: To keep unlimited or go Mobileshare?

I wouldn't do it.
You're risking going over your data and having to keep paying overages.
Data use is unpredictable and in the future it will only keep increasing and devices, apps, video, audio and such evolve and improve.
Also if the other person starts using up data and you keep using around 8GB now even with throttled speeds you're very close to your limit. Unthrottled you will use way more than 6-8GB and thus the fees and overages can start racking up.

jian said:

So I have 2 lines on my contract, one is grandfathered unlimited plan and the other line has 3GB per month. After text and minutes, it's roughly 155 per month.

Now, on my unlimited plan with 6 plus, I use about 6-8 gigs of data every month, and that being said, I always get throttled... the other line with 3GB allowance however, uses less than one gig per month.

I've checked on ATT, if I were to switch to 10GB mobile share, it will be only 10 dollars more per month, with unlimited text and minutes and plus mobile hotspot. While in theory I do have my data unlimited, I really just have 5GB of full speed....

My main concern is that, for the past several years, I was always able to get a new iPhone on launch day, we just swap eligibilities. For example, iPhone 4S I used my line with unlimited data, and a year later with iPhone 5, I did a upgrade swap with the 3GB plan, 5S was upgraded with the unlimited data line again, and with iPhone 6 I used the 3GB plan again....
If I were to go mobileshare, will I be able to get a new iPhone every year like i used to? is it a smart idea for my situation?

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If you don't mind me asking, how much are you paying right now and how many minutes do you have? I'm thinking about switching to at&t but I want to know the pricing.

I struggled with this issue a few years back and finally went with mobile share. We haven't looked back. A few questions, do you have access to a FAN discount? Will you be bringing your phones into the new plan or buying new ones at the time of swap?

I have 3 iPhones and a iPad with 20 GB of rollover data and a fan discount

Monthly plan is 100.00 with 22% fan discount = 78.00
Since I brought the phones into the plan they charge 15 each/ month = 45.00
iPad is wifi/LTE for 10.00/month

My bill with taxes is around 147.00 and we get monthly roll over on the data which gives us on average 30 GB a month. We love it!

If you play your cards right they might just double your data for the same price like they did mine.

If you have more people or different devices under your plan, then mobile share is right for you. If not, then I would stick with unlimited.

jian said:

So I have 2 lines on my contract, one is grandfathered unlimited plan and the other line has 3GB per month. After text and minutes, it's roughly 155 per month.

Now, on my unlimited plan with 6 plus, I use about 6-8 gigs of data every month, and that being said, I always get throttled... the other line with 3GB allowance however, uses less than one gig per month.

I've checked on ATT, if I were to switch to 10GB mobile share, it will be only 10 dollars more per month, with unlimited text and minutes and plus mobile hotspot. While in theory I do have my data unlimited, I really just have 5GB of full speed....

My main concern is that, for the past several years, I was always able to get a new iPhone on launch day, we just swap eligibilities. For example, iPhone 4S I used my line with unlimited data, and a year later with iPhone 5, I did a upgrade swap with the 3GB plan, 5S was upgraded with the unlimited data line again, and with iPhone 6 I used the 3GB plan again....
If I were to go mobileshare, will I be able to get a new iPhone every year like i used to? is it a smart idea for my situation?

Click to expand...

I also like that since we have a grandfathered unlimited family plan(4 lines) we are still eligible for the 2 year upgrades at subsidized pricing. We like to get brand spanking new iPhones every 2 years.

As far as the throttling. I watch a lot of video especially on YouTube. There's a difference when you're throttled but I wouldn't call it unusable. I would call it a 'little PIA'.

Don't know if you know but AT&T is supposed to stop the current throttling practice and implement 'network management' in 2015. An AT&T employee on another forum said May.

Mobile Share in our case with 4 unlimited lines would be not much less with what I'm paying now. Currently the total data usage between all 4 lines averages 28GB/month. With my employer discount and including taxes my AT&T bill is $217/month. The only thing that Mobile Share has is a mobile hotspot and none of us have ever wanted to or needed a mobile hotspot.

As far as Mobile Share having unlimited voice and text. Our current plan we have rollover minutes and mobile to ANY mobile. Not just mobile to mobile. We also use Google Hangouts a lot to make calls to landlines. We have unlimited family text. So having unlimited voice and text doesn't really mean anything in our case.

My opinion is data usage will increase and it's nice having unlimited data.

Maybe I'm not a noticeable or very picky person but throttling isn't as bad as most people make it out to be in my opinion. Yes it's not good but it's not that horrible.

jian said:

So I have 2 lines on my contract, one is grandfathered unlimited plan and the other line has 3GB per month. After text and minutes, it's roughly 155 per month.

Now, on my unlimited plan with 6 plus, I use about 6-8 gigs of data every month, and that being said, I always get throttled... the other line with 3GB allowance however, uses less than one gig per month.

I've checked on ATT, if I were to switch to 10GB mobile share, it will be only 10 dollars more per month, with unlimited text and minutes and plus mobile hotspot. While in theory I do have my data unlimited, I really just have 5GB of full speed....

My main concern is that, for the past several years, I was always able to get a new iPhone on launch day, we just swap eligibilities. For example, iPhone 4S I used my line with unlimited data, and a year later with iPhone 5, I did a upgrade swap with the 3GB plan, 5S was upgraded with the unlimited data line again, and with iPhone 6 I used the 3GB plan again....
If I were to go mobileshare, will I be able to get a new iPhone every year like i used to? is it a smart idea for my situation?

Click to expand...

Dont do it....keep that grandfathered unlimited line forever....u get 2 subsidies... I got an iphone 6 for 79 bucks last xmas...from walmart deal.....on mobileshare same phone from them would be 550..make sure u got a good grandfathered plan....if not u cud switch to another geandfathered plan and not lose yor unlimited data....call retentions...ask for family talk nation 550 with rollover.....50 bucks for 1st line o.99 for 2nd line. 3 lines max...sweet talk retentions and ask them to give u unlimited family messaging for 20 bucks instead of 30....
I think theyre changing the throttling already....im at 6.5 gigs already this month and still not throttled...wasnt throttled last month either and i went over 5 gogs.....
I also have a 2nd plan thats 20 gig mobile share rollover.....with 3 other lines on it......1 of those linew burns thru 13 to 15 gigs a month alone.....mainly just a ton of spotify....so data will go way faster than u think. 10 gigs may not cut it for u.....especially with netflix..utube...etc....worst part about mobile share is yor always gonna b checkin everyones data usage to see if yor close to goin over....save yorself the trouble.....we never even use wifi on our 2 unlimited lines and i never have to wory about goin over.....no hotspot on the old unlimited is no big deal...just get a 6 plus and your good to go......no overages charges is far better than having hotspot......

I keep grandfather plan for now. If Att cancels their 2 years subsidy upgrades then I think what to do. I hate Att international roaming, very expensive. I travel 4-5 times a year + I have to keep a Canadian number since I work for Canadian company. If they cancel upgrades I rather go with t-mo, they better and better from day to day, also next iphone probably has LTE 12

T Mobile has 2 phones unlimited data, no contract, for $100, bring your own phones

jian said:

Fan account? Not that I know of, nor do I even know what that even is lol. I do however have a 15% corp discount, which really only reduce my bill for like 10 bucks.
when I get new phone every year, I basically renew my contract for 2 years, I get the newest phone, the other line will get what I had replaced, and we will usually get rid of the 2 year old phone on eBay or whatever.

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FAN account is a corporate discount. That discount applies to the cost of the data, so if you were to go with the $100 10GB share plan, it'd only cost you $85.

With these mobile share plans 10GB and above, it's actually cheaper to buy the phone outright or use Next than it is to go with the subsidy. Keep in mind that when you upgrade at the $200 price, your monthly cost per line is $40. When you buy the phone outright, the monthly cost is $15.

You obviously have way more data allowance and more devices under your contract, and you basically pay 2 dollars more, what the hell lol

How did you get them to double your data?

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AT&T was offering to double data for a while, I believe it was in response to a Sprint promotion. You just had to call in and ask. Maybe you could get something similar?

I got rid of my unlimited data a long time ago and switched to mobile share sometime last year. I pay about $205 per month for 10GB of data(which is doubled so I have 20GB) and I have 7 lines. I also have a 25% discount through my employer.

jian said:

True...but when it's throttled it's pretty much unusable...for most scenarios besides basic web browsing. Man...#ATTDilemma


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Currently I have 550 minutes per month, but since everything is online, I use barely 50 minutes....with over 3k rollover minutes. The other line uses about 300 minutes per month.
I currently pay about 150 after tax. If I were to switch to MobileShare, it will be 150 PRE tax, so probably around 170 ish.

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Fan account? Not that I know of, nor do I even know what that even is lol. I do however have a 15% corp discount, which really only reduce my bill for like 10 bucks.
when I get new phone every year, I basically renew my contract for 2 years, I get the newest phone, the other line will get what I had replaced, and we will usually get rid of the 2 year old phone on eBay or whatever.

Your plan is amazing, if I get 30GB I would pretty much go mobileshare right away, but from the website I am seeing only 10GB "upgrade," and I will be paying about 10-15 more pre tax for that, with unlimited minute, text, mobile data rollover, and mobile hotspot.

You obviously have way more data allowance and more devices under your contract, and you basically pay 2 dollars more, what the hell lol

How did you get them to double your data?

Click to expand...

I think his point on the throttling thing is that if the data is usable, you will use more of it and go over your limit. If you are throttled at a certain point you will only use your data up to that point. The double data may have been a limited time thing. Some of us on ATT got in on that last Fall and went from 10g/mo to 20g (with no throttling). Your 15% corporate discount is the same as a FAN account discount.

I dropped my unlimited plan about three months ago. I choose the 10GB plan and have 2 lines on it, will add a third next year. The differences? Well, now I can surf with my iPad through my phone hotspot, didn't realize how cool that would be. The price is about the same as with unlimited, but we get new phones every 12 months and have warranties on them.

T5BRICK said:

FAN account is a corporate discount. That discount applies to the cost of the data, so if you were to go with the $100 10GB share plan, it'd only cost you $85.

With these mobile share plans 10GB and above, it's actually cheaper to buy the phone outright or use Next than it is to go with the subsidy. Keep in mind that when you upgrade at the $200 price, your monthly cost per line is $40. When you buy the phone outright, the monthly cost is $15.



AT&T was offering to double data for a while, I believe it was in response to a Sprint promotion. You just had to call in and ask. Maybe you could get something similar?

I got rid of my unlimited data a long time ago and switched to mobile share sometime last year. I pay about $205 per month for 10GB of data(which is doubled so I have 20GB) and I have 7 lines. I also have a 25% discount through my employer.

Click to expand...

I guess if we watched our data Mobile Share might work. Currently we have 4 lines each with unlimited data. Total we use 28GB between the 4 lines. We somewhat get in WiFi whenever we can but don't really look for WiFi when we are out and about. Like when we are at home we get on WiFi. And some other places we frequent but we don't monitor it too much.

I tried my hardest to stubbornly keep my grandpa unlimited but between its throttling and the cost benefits of the next plan having three lines, my case for my death grip just got weaker and weaker. It simply made more sense to go with the 10gb plan and keep wifi on all phones turned on while keeping an eye on usage.
Oh wells.