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AT&T Claiming I Tether...When I Don't

Me Too

This happened or is happening to me as well! I am an AT&T customer with a grand fathered Unlimited Plan. I received a text the other day and the attached letter in the mail today. This is absolute BS. I do not tether, period. I have an iPhone 5 which has never been jailbroken and updated to the most recent software.

The customer service rep told me that controlling streaming music apps via my cars head unit could trigger this. So I should never Pause or Skip forward via the cars radio. My car doesn't even have this ability so thats not what triggered it. My wifes ****** BT FM transmitter has this ability but I don't think I have ever done it. The CSR also told me to manually search every single app on my phone online to see if it has the ability to "tether, link or (some other BS term). She said they have no way to determine what triggered it, only that my phone triggered it. I thought tethering wasn't even possible unless you jailbreak your iphone? What am i missing?

This is absolute BS. I am totally enraged at this accusation.
 

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I'd be so pissed if they tried that with me. :mad:

And what is a "tethering app"?
 
so i guess all those with unlimited data plan (like me) will start getting this BS letter or text from ATT. maybe this is their way to get rid of all the UDP legally. that's not good/right.....
 
RCRod83 said:
Neither is tethering if you know that it's not included with your data plan.
Click to expand...

well in my case i never and don't really care if i can tether. have never and not even tried since i had my UDP. just worried that this is their way of getting rid of UDP - they will claim that you're tethering even though that you're not.
 
Does AT&T think we do not talk? What a bunch of scumbags. Anyways who the heck cares if you tether 5GB's of data vs genuinely use 5GB's of data on a smartphone? These days data is data is data....I'd be pissed. With an iPhone there are no tether apps and if its not jailbroken you can't do it. Last time I went into a VZW store I got accused of violating there policies and the people telling me this had no idea what they were talking about. I'd be tempted to go in with my phone and show them it but that is sort of an invasion of privacy for me and shouldnt be needed....

EDIT: I remember the big debate about tethering, whether a carrier had the right to decide if your connection was limited to your phone....I don't think they do. If a phone offers an app or a native feature they shouldn't have the right to block it. For me its almost a net neutrality thing.
 
RCRod83 said:
Or they say they don't tether. AT&T has their tethering detection down to a science by now.
Click to expand...

So we are just a couple of liars? AT&T couldn't possibly have made a mistake?

I don't tether. I have no use for it and therefore won't pay for it. If I needed it, I would add it to my service. I wouldn't steal it and then complain when I got caught. That's some real entitled child sh&t.

You seem like the questionable one here, siding with a company known for horrible customer service and wanting to get users off grand fathered unlimited plans at all costs.
 
This thread is my main issue with AT&T. I pay for Unlimited and they define that as 5gb of LTE speeds and anything past 5gb is unlimited of what you can get (0.1mb up/down). Ok fine, so what you're telling me is I can only use 5gb. Then stay away with this tethering crap because if I only get 5gb to use, I should be able to do anything I want with that data.

But noooo, they have it stipulated that tethering is a whole different beast than your standard data plan and they want your $$$.

I'll admit, I JB my iPhone and tether for free. It is one thing that has kept me on my Unlimited plan with AT&T and iPhone, the fact that I can do this. So it is just so hard for me to accept that they bait and switch years after the fact because they don't make "NEXT" money off me.
 
nateo200 said:
Does AT&T think we do not talk? What a bunch of scumbags. Anyways who the heck cares if you tether 5GB's of data vs genuinely use 5GB's of data on a smartphone?

EDIT: I remember the big debate about tethering, whether a carrier had the right to decide if your connection was limited to your phone....I don't think they do.
Click to expand...

Looks like you don't understand the TOS.

AT&T TOS clearly states no tethering. It doesn't matter what you think of whether or not they can state that, they have and the user agreed to it. Case closed.

The scumbags are the people who break their TOS because they think they are special and entitled.

As far as lawsuits go, AT&T has the right to accuse someone of something. Sometimes they are right, sometimes they are wrong. But being wrong does not mean they are are opening themselves to lawsuits. If that was the case, no one would ever accuse someone of something again.

In these cases, I wonder if they are detecting that there are apps on the phone that enable tethering and are going with the approach of "where there is smoke, there is fire".
 
mpayne2k said:
This thread is my main issue with AT&T. I pay for Unlimited and they define that as 5gb of LTE speeds and anything past 5gb is unlimited of what you can get (0.1mb up/down). Ok fine, so what you're telling me is I can only use 5gb. Then stay away with this tethering crap because if I only get 5gb to use, I should be able to do anything I want with that data.

But noooo, they have it stipulated that tethering is a whole different beast than your standard data plan and they want your $$$.

I'll admit, I JB my iPhone and tether for free. It is one thing that has kept me on my Unlimited plan with AT&T and iPhone, the fact that I can do this. So it is just so hard for me to accept that they bait and switch years after the fact because they don't make "NEXT" money off me.
Click to expand...

I agree that it's BS, the whole tethering deal... I mean, why not just let people use it?

Anyway... that said, they don't make NEXT money off people who pay full price for their phones, either. So, it is possible to avoid NEXT and not stick to the UDP.

I gave up UDP just last month. After having it on more than one line since 2007. I just got sick of the throttling.

We went 40GB and it's plenty. Cost is comparable.

But... I have 9 lines on my account, which is likely helping me.

Most of those don't use any data (less than 1GB). A few of us use 5 or more GB. Last month, we only used about 23GB total.

Eh. No throttle. It was pleasant. I hate it came to all that, though.
 
mpayne2k said:
I'll admit, I JB my iPhone and tether for free.
Click to expand...

You are part of the problem which is why the unlimited plans went away.

You violated the TOS of the phone and you violated the TOS of your plan.

This unethical, entitlement mentality just ruins things for everyone else.
 
bunnicula said:
I agree that it's BS, the whole tethering deal... I mean, why not just let people use it?

Anyway... that said, they don't make NEXT money off people who pay full price for their phones, either. So, it is possible to avoid NEXT and not stick to the UDP.

I gave up UDP just last month. After having it on more than one line since 2007. I just got sick of the throttling.

We went 40GB and it's plenty. Cost is comparable.

But... I have 9 lines on my account, which is likely helping me.

Most of those don't use any data (less than 1GB). A few of us use 5 or more GB. Last month, we only used about 23GB total.

Eh. No throttle. It was pleasant. I hate it came to all that, though.
Click to expand...

I don't get to my 5gb limit every month either, so the way I see it, if I pay for 5gb and tether, but don't reach my cap, who is harmed in that?
 
mpayne2k said:
I don't get to my 5gb limit every month either, so the way I see it, if I pay for 5gb and tether, but don't reach my cap, who is harmed in that?
Click to expand...

And if you went over and got throttled, whether it was on your iPhone, an iPad, a laptop... what's the difference?
 
bunnicula said:
And if you went over and got throttled, whether it was on your iPhone, an iPad, a laptop... what's the difference?
Click to expand...

Their claim of benefit of getting a tethering plan is that it doesn't affect my 5gb data limit for throttling and is 5gb of its own for $50 a month...getting back to the fact that I PAY for unlimited...why should I have to worry about how much data I can get?
 
mpayne2k said:
Their claim of benefit of getting a tethering plan is that it doesn't affect my 5gb data limit for throttling and is 5gb of its own for $50 a month...getting back to the fact that I PAY for unlimited...why should I have to worry about how much data I can get?
Click to expand...

It is highly illogical. Either tell people they won't get throttled at a 5GB hard cutoff AND that this means no tethering or tell them they can tether and you'll cap the full-speed access at 5GB, but it seems pretty crappy to do BOTH.

The really lousy part is that they're going to just bump people off the unlimited plans even if they cannot actually prove they're tethering and they will not be allowed back on the plan they just got bumped off of. Ugh. I'm so irritated with them right now.
 
Matador Red said:
I thought tethering wasn't even possible unless you jailbreak your iphone? What am i missing?
Click to expand...

There have been some apps on the appstore that were made specifically for the "secret" function of tethering. They get shut down by Apple pretty quickly though.

I also don't see how a head unit would trigger an alert like this. All the unit is doing is sending the device a message to skip. So would a buetooth headset do the same? Just seems like the CSR is telling you whatever he/she can in hopes you end the call quicker, IMO.
 
McDaddio said:
Looks like you don't understand the TOS.

AT&T TOS clearly states no tethering. It doesn't matter what you think of whether or not they can state that, they have and the user agreed to it. Case closed.

The scumbags are the people who break their TOS because they think they are special and entitled.

As far as lawsuits go, AT&T has the right to accuse someone of something. Sometimes they are right, sometimes they are wrong. But being wrong does not mean they are are opening themselves to lawsuits. If that was the case, no one would ever accuse someone of something again.

In these cases, I wonder if they are detecting that there are apps on the phone that enable tethering and are going with the approach of "where there is smoke, there is fire".
Click to expand...

I'm not condoning tethering against the TOS, I'm disagreeing with it but not saying its right to violate it.
 
Matador Red said:
So we are just a couple of liars? AT&T couldn't possibly have made a mistake?

I don't tether. I have no use for it and therefore won't pay for it. If I needed it, I would add it to my service. I wouldn't steal it and then complain when I got caught. That's some real entitled child sh&t.

You seem like the questionable one here, siding with a company known for horrible customer service and wanting to get users off grand fathered unlimited plans at all costs.
Click to expand...

I'm playing devil's advocate here. AT&T is a multi-billion dollar organization with over 100 million customers.

Their tethering detection system has to be on point, otherwise they would be falsely accusing millions of their customers.

I'm not siding with anyone, I'm simply looking at it from the point that I don't think either parties are being 100% honest here.

----------
terraphantm said:
Because AT&T has never screwed anything up before, right? :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

And customers never broke the Terms of Services, right? :rolleyes: (I too know how to include the rolleyes in my post).
 
RCRod83 said:
I'm playing devil's advocate here. AT&T is a multi-billion dollar organization with over 100 million customers.

Their tethering detection system has to be on point, otherwise they would be falsely accusing millions of their customers.

I'm not siding with anyone, I'm simply looking at it from the point that I don't think either parties are being 100% honest here.
Click to expand...


Ok, devil's advocate is understandable.

I don't know about the OP but I do not do any tethering, that I am aware of. The CSR at ATT made it sound like I could have downloaded an app that they qualify as a tethering or linking app. I just want to know what triggered their system so it doesn't happen again. I am looking to stay within my TOS and keep the plan I want and pay for. I am not looking to looking to lie and steal the ability to tether.

If anyone has anything helpful to say about finding and removing the offensive app or action that would be very helpful.
 
nateo200 said:
whether a carrier had the right to decide if your connection was limited to your phone....I don't think they do. If a phone offers an app or a native feature they shouldn't have the right to block it. For me its almost a net neutrality thing.
Click to expand...

Check the Terms of Service you agreed to when you last performed a phone upgrade. You had the right to not agree to those terms and take your business elsewhere. Not that I have any love for AT&T, but anyone using their service did agree to some pretty specific terms / conditions on that service.


Not cool though incorrectly accusing someone if they didn't break the T&C. They ought to have to show proof positive of breech of contract if they're going to penalize someone. Not some shady B.S. about a tethering detector that can't record proof.
 
Let them change your terms. Then drop them and move onto a carrier who isn't shady.

They did that to me 2 or 3 years ago. I dropped it, brought a complaint up through BBB and they dropped my ETF charges and I went TMobile.
 
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