AT&T to Throttle Unlimited Data Plan Customers Starting in October

[Gasu E.]

I am one of the grandfathered in people and my biggest problem with this is.

I'm going to start keeping a record for when my service isn't usable and then I'll just deduct that out of my bill at the end of the month and we'll see how that goes over...

You do realize, of course, that if you don't pay your phone bill in full, ATT has the legal right to remove your grandfathered status.

 

[jackc]

Looks like the "sue 'em" crowd needs some waambulance chasers

 

[manu chao]

Again, do not punish the paying customers for your lack of foresight. Do not go back on your contractual obligations.

Does it matter whether AT&T stops rolling over existing contracts (which I think they have no legal obligation) and let's their customers sign new contracts which have more explicit data limits or if AT&T just breaks their contracts and defacto behaves as if their customers have signed their new, revised contract?

Not really, the end result is the same, and almost nobody will sue AT&T over this (because if you sue AT&T could just backtrack only for you and wait until your contract is up and change the conditions then).

[url=http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/191/unlimitedy.png]Image[/URL]

That is British English, in American English it means a marketing term that pretends to offer the British definition and everybody pretends to believe it.

 

[ks-man]

...But nobody, dare I say even Apple, predicted the exponential growth of data usage in just a few years.

People tend to irrationally cling to the concept of unlimited data as a right, even when it causes people who abuse the system to impact the performance of other users. Though it's funny how the macrumor community staunchly defends their rights under TOS, but will actively encourage exploiting any loophole, jailbreak or rule bending that benefits the customer. They key is just to ramble about evil AT&T and it's all acceptable....

Very well said. I think we can all agree that with this new policy AT&T should:

1) Let users know approximately how much data/month will put them in danger of being throttled
2) Let users know if you get throttled what your d/l speeds will be

Outside of those two things though it seems completely reasonable for AT&T to throttle very heavy data users. People around here think that all users should have truly unlimited usage which is impossible. Ask them what is appropriate, 5Gb, 50Gb or 5000Gb/month and they'll just say "yes, AT&T should make their network capable." This is irrational and people need to grasp the fact that data usage is a scarce resource and no longer realistic to be unlimited.

 

[chembox]

As of lately, I've never gone over 2GB from my unlimited data plan.

But, I think I am going to run Netflix on my iPhone 24/7 on AT&T's network just to help for the "congestion" issues that AT&T refuses to fix.

Throttling your users is no way to deal with this situation, how about investing in better network infrastructure with the millions of dollars in your pocket?

 

[Gasu E.]

Usually, when a service provider modifies something in the service, it also activates the option for the customer to cancel their agreement without paying for the cancellation fee. I don’t know if it is true for AT&T plans as well.

I'm quite sure ATT would be happy to cancel anybody's "Unlimited" plan N/C.

 

[Apple 26.2]

No one is actually surprised, are they?

 

[lkrupp]

Counting down until I switch to Verizon...

Good luck with that. Verizon has shown a pattern of copying at&t lately. You are not going to get away from this no matter which carrier you go to. You just look foolish.

 

[FtrV8]

*********. I have 15 days left in my billing cycle and I've used 8075.76 MB (8 GB). It's all from Netflix.

2 days left, and I've used 14 GB, Slinging CNBC on the way to work.

Using my device as it is suppose to be.

 

[Mr Fusion]

I'm not, and no one else should be either.

No one is actually surprised, are they?

...Because I missed the executive meeting held by all cellphone providers a couple years ago where it was decided to tell everyone that in a world where more and more data is being consumed every day, capped data usage is the future, (YES, throttled = capped.)

The solution is simple though. If you're throttled and not happy about it, voice your complaints with AT&T. If you're still not satisfied, leave AT&T, and your iPhone behind if need be. No one in this world "needs" an iPhone. Switch and move on.

For those of you who "really really want" a truly unlimited data iPhone, well... Good luck with the struggle against the man. But when tech geeks are even drinking the Cool-Aid about how capped data is a force that can't be reckoned with, well...

 

[vitzr]

Life is unfair. Big companies do as they like. There's an ebb and flow that is obvious for all to see.

 

[MCIowaRulz]

it was never in any fine print for the iphone plans.
It was only for data connect unlimited plans.
The 5gb cap on smartphone plans was pure myth and has been busted many times.

At&t is following t-mobile. T-mobile starts throttling users down to edge speeds once they hit 2gb of data.

att is t-mobile

 

[cameronjpu]

I am still an unlimited plan holder, and this just upsets me. There is a reason I adopted early and got the unlimited plan; it was so I could use it in an unlimited fashion if I need to. Effectively limiting my ability to data is dick move. I say this with the knowledge that I have never come close to being in the top 5% of users. The most data I have ever used in 1 month is about 1GB, but I usually about half of that. I keep my unlimited data plan for the off chance I may need it for some reason...someday.

However, if ATT wanted to just sell me Data as I go, I would be happy to buy that, but they do not want to do that because they know it would make them less money over the long run. Instead, they choose to only offer me plans that go by the month and not by actual usage.

Wow, is that dumb. So you've been paying $30 instead of $25 for 12 months now, a total extra expenditure of $60. For that $60 you could have bought enough data to use 2+1+1+1+1+1+1 GB in a month, or 8GB for that "just in case" fund you are holding out for. Duh.

@#$!, looks like I'll be affected. My cellular data averages around 10GBs per month. So much for unlimited being truly unlimited.

Good riddance. Your ridiculous usage has been subsidized by me for long enough.

Why not just download/sync the podcasts you're listening to? I have all of mine pulled down and synced every morning. That way, if I end up being on a train/tunnel, I don't lose the stream anyway.

Why would he do that? Since he wasn't being charged or limited from it, he might as well just abuse the rest of us and overuse 3G data. Thankfully that's changing now.

Just checked my usage...8.3 GB received since 6/28...I'm guessing that will put me in the top 5%. I have a 50-60 minute daily commute (via train), and like to pass the time watching Netflix...guess I'll dusting off my kindle in October.

Everyone else on your train will thank you (and the rest of the hogs slowing down the 3G), now that they can use their internet with reasonable speed. The speed that THEY paid for that you were preventing them from using.

 

[LwoodPDowd]

5% of who?

What almost everyone seems to be missing here is who are they counting as users. All ATT users or ATT users with unlimited plans? Let me do a quick estimation on how much of a difference this makes.

ATT on their website claims 95.5 million users. Despite the rise of smart phones the last few years, I would guess those with data plans are still in the minority. To be generous, let's say half their customers have something other than the default $2/MB plan. That leaves 48 million customers paying for data plans. In their press release they say they have 15 million customers on tiered plans. So very generously lets say they have 33 million people on unlimited data plans (probably way fewer) If they are going by the top 5% of ALL users, they are capping almost 4.8 million customers. Which means they are limiting the top 15% of unlimited users. So no instead of one in 20, it is one in 7 people PAYING for unlimited usage. Are you that confident you don't more than 1 in 7 people? They really need to be much more clear about who makes up the pool of data users. It would be completely inappropriate to include anyone who didn't have an unlimited plan in making this cutoff.

 

[cameronjpu]

[url=http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/191/unlimitedy.png]Image[/URL]

I didn't see any finite nouns on that definition. Did you notice that? I wonder why power, water, oil, or food are not found under the definition of examples of things that are capable of being unlimited?

I am on day 24 of 31 day of this billing cycle. I have used 114.89 MB. I am on AT&T's unlimited data plan. They are getting rich on customers like me who are scared to switch plans.

They talk about the top 5%. What about the bottom 5% or 10% they are making a lot of money on.

I am tempted to jailbreak and use with my iPad.

Yeah it's sooo unfair that they force you to pay $30 even though you use so little.

Why are people so stupid?

That is British English, in American English it means a marketing term that pretends to offer the British definition and everybody pretends to believe it.

Only idiots believe it. The rest of us know the truth.

 

[Wild-Bill]

A t $ t

I guess they were to busy counting their $ billions $ and forgot to build out their network.

As soon as the new iPhone comes out, I'm saying sayonara to AT$T. It will be a refreshing change to make calls that don't drop constantly.

 

[Reimer]

Sad to see some users buying into the same old lies that the telecoms spew (i.e. that heavy users cause network congestion and light users subsidizing heavy users).

Traffic shaping and data caps are means that help limit and delay network infrastructure improvements. It plays on the fact that the majority of people can't seem to differentiate between bandwidth and aggregate data usage. The cause of network congestion is peak usage, not aggregate usage as these telecoms have most of you believing.

 

[iMaconApple]

iCloud and iPod touch with built in 3G chip is coming...AT&T is getting ready for a bigger bandwidth suck up..a iPod touch with 3G will be more easy to carry then a iPad 3G its pocket friendly like iPhone..now a days we use data more then ever voip/emails/web/Facebook/twitter/push notification ect to communicate ..Heck I can survive with a iPod touch with 3G that is if had unlimited data..I use apps to text so why I pay extra 20$ for unlimited texting..sometimes I'm one of the 5% data hog but not as much depends on the monthly use but I never go crazy 7GB+..mostly stream pandora radio while I drive. sometime use my iPhone to tether to my iPad 2 stream movies or on iPhone do some mid web surfing on the iPad..I think this is temporary for now till AT&T or other companies get there service were it can Handel much faster and better way to absorb data eating devices..

 

[ks-man]

What almost everyone seems to be missing here is who are they counting as users. All ATT users or ATT users with unlimited plans? Let me do a quick estimation on how much of a difference this makes.

ATT on their website claims 95.5 million users. Despite the rise of smart phones the last few years, I would guess those with data plans are still in the minority. To be generous, let's say half their customers have something other than the default $2/MB plan. That leaves 48 million customers paying for data plans. In their press release they say they have 15 million customers on tiered plans. So very generously lets say they have 33 million people on unlimited data plans (probably way fewer) If they are going by the top 5% of ALL users, they are capping almost 4.8 million customers. Which means they are limiting the top 15% of unlimited users. So no instead of one in 20, it is one in 7 people PAYING for unlimited usage. Are you that confident you don't more than 1 in 7 people? They really need to be much more clear about who makes up the pool of data users. It would be completely inappropriate to include anyone who didn't have an unlimited plan in making this cutoff.

Unfortunately I'm guessing they are leaving it vague intentionally and they will work towards a path where if you go over 2Gb/month and aren't paying for extra bandwidth at that point you'll be throttled. It might not start out that way but will probably be the way it goes. The good news is they will supposedly send out warnings as you are approaching the limit and throttle threshold so I imagine we'll figure out soon enough what is acceptable.

 

[derickdub]

Sad to see some users buying into the same old lies that the telecoms spew (i.e. that heavy users cause network congestion and light users subsidizing heavy users).

Traffic shaping and data caps are means that help limit and delay network infrastructure improvements. It plays on the fact that the majority of people can't seem to differentiate between bandwidth and aggregate data usage. The cause of network congestion is peak usage, not aggregate usage as these telecoms have most of you believing.

The people who use the most data in terms of aggregate usage are also the ones who are streaming video all the time though. And a video stream is using up much more of a networks bandwidth than sending emails or browsing the web.

I honestly can't see how anyone can use 5GB though. I send thousands of emails a month, many with images, and stream internet radio when I'm in my car and still barely use 2GB. And that's with no wifi usage.

Maybe AT&T should just do what cable providers do and offered tiered bandwidth packages, and the ones who insist on streaming video and tethering constantly can pay for a faster connection. I certainly do not need 3mbps for sending emails.

 

[revelated]

I fully support this.

They are not targeting the high volume user. They are targeting the abuser who tethers his entire home internet connection to his phone.

There are people who live in the sticks - by their choice, mind - and try to use mobile broadband for home connections. I don't agree with that approach. in my mind, if a person wants fast internet, they will live in an urban or suburban area that offers it. If you choose to live out in the middle of nowhere with pigs and mongoose....get satellite broadband.

 

[ripper998]

This policy is to stop people from networking there whole house off a cell phone. To do that you need to jail break your phone and use it outside apples policy which att did NOT sign up for. All you illegal tether folks brought this on yourselves.

 

[rdlink]

abuser? At&t sold "unlimited" data plans at one point and a contract was signed with the customer. By using as much data as the customer wants does not make that person an "abuser" -- they are simply operating within the contract.

You have either fallen for the telecom brainwashing that is currently going on over data charges -- or work for a telecom yourself and want to promote the myth of an unlimited plan user as an "abuser".

thank you!

 

[ChoMomma]

Just checked my data usage on AT&T from March 2010 until this past month (June 2011). Most I ever used was 1GB during a billing cycle, usually my average is around 400MB. Granted, I might stay around 1-2GB/cycle if my connection at work was usable, but alas.. it is barely even there.

Incidentally, my 1GB billing cycle was while on vacation with my kids in Orlando, and I was emailing photos, posting videos and constantly getting directions and using AroundMe to find places to eat. I'm still using a iPhone 3Gs so I think if I had a iPhone 4 (capable of 720p video) my usage would have been much higher. When I upgrade to an iPhone 5 (september-ish time frame) I expect my usage to start to rise as a result of the new capabilities I'll have at my disposal.

 

[cameronjpu]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J2 Safari/6533.18.5)

I fully support this.

They are not targeting the high volume user. They are targeting the abuser who tethers his entire home internet connection to his phone.

There are people who live in the sticks - by their choice, mind - and try to use mobile broadband for home connections. I don't agree with that approach. in my mind, if a person wants fast internet, they will live in an urban or suburban area that offers it. If you choose to live out in the middle of nowhere with pigs and mongoose....get satellite broadband.

Nothing wrong with that. Just PAY for it!