ATT Plan is confusing and ridiculous - any help here on understanding the real option

Sean Dempsey

Sean Dempsey

macrumors 68000
So I upgraded my 2 phones to the 5S. We are on a family plan.

My 2nd line has unlimted data from a while ago. My main line, apparantly they require me to have the 5gig data pro plan to have personal hotspot turned on since they don't want me going over the data plan, they want it to have a lot of headroom... ok. They say they cannot turn on personal hotspot without it.

But, with my other lines unlimted plan... they say they can't turn it on there either without the 5gig plan. wtf. It's unlimited data, but I can't have personal hotspot turned on?

I am on the 550 minutes plan... family messaging unlimited, and then I guess the required $50 data play 5gig for my line, and $30 unlimited for the other line? The billl ends up being about $220! WTF. And I Can't even get personal hotspot on both phones without REMOVING my unlimited data for $30, and getting 5gig for $50.

What the hell is going on here. The 611 operator didn't seem to know, we just kept going over the policy options. Is all that really necessarily for the freaking personal hotspots?
 
Sean Dempsey said:
So I upgraded my 2 phones to the 5S. We are on a family plan.

My 2nd line has unlimted data from a while ago. My main line, apparantly they require me to have the 5gig data pro plan to have personal hotspot turned on since they don't want me going over the data plan, they want it to have a lot of headroom... ok. They say they cannot turn on personal hotspot without it.

But, with my other lines unlimted plan... they say they can't turn it on there either without the 5gig plan. wtf. It's unlimited data, but I can't have personal hotspot turned on?

I am on the 550 minutes plan... family messaging unlimited, and then I guess the required $50 data play 5gig for my line, and $30 unlimited for the other line? The billl ends up being about $220! WTF. And I Can't even get personal hotspot on both phones without REMOVING my unlimited data for $30, and getting 5gig for $50.

What the hell is going on here. The 611 operator didn't seem to know, we just kept going over the policy options. Is all that really necessarily for the freaking personal hotspots?
Click to expand...

Let me see if I get what you are saying. You are upset because you do not get hotspot with unlimited data?

Its been known for several years now that hotspot requires the 5GB $50 plan or share everything plans. It has never been available for unlimited data plans, and never will be. If you want to keep unlimited data, you can't have hotspot. Thats the price you pay.
 
Mlrollin91 said:
Let me see if I get what you are saying. You are upset because you do not get hotspot with unlimited data?

Its been known for several years now that hotspot requires the 5GB $50 plan or share everything plans. It has never been available for unlimited data plans, and never will be. If you want to keep unlimited data, you can't have hotspot. Thats the price you pay.
Click to expand...

Before I upgraded my phones 3 weeks ago, I had a personal hotspot on a 3gig plan. I can't keep that?

What is the share everything plan? That sounds a lot better than $80 in data and only getting 1 hotspot plan.
 
Sean Dempsey said:
Before I upgraded my phones 3 weeks ago, I had a personal hotspot on a 3gig plan. I can't keep that?

What is the share everything plan? That sounds a lot better than $80 in data and only getting 1 hotspot plan.
Click to expand...

I don't think you should have had hotspot on the 3GB plan to begin with. It requires the 5GB $50 plan. Or at least it always has in the past and something has recently changed. But based on your experience it sounds like it hasn't changed.

But now I'm confused because you originally said you had unlimited on both lines. Kept unlimited on one and changed the other to the 5GB plan. So now where did this 3GB plan come from?
 
Mlrollin91 said:
I don't think you should have had hotspot on the 3GB plan to begin with. It requires the 5GB $50 plan. Or at least it always has in the past and something has recently changed. But based on your experience it sounds like it hasn't changed.

But now I'm confused because you originally said you had unlimited on both lines. Kept unlimited on one and changed the other to the 5GB plan. So now where did this 3GB plan come from?
Click to expand...

line's, sorry.

Amazing how AT&T can just hump us with no lube.
 
The mobile hotspot is only am option with the 5gb plan. It's not an option they can just turn on or off. The other option is going to Mobile Share. With mobile share you will get unl talk and txt and share the data. Then all the phones will have the mobile hotspot option.
 
Mrbobb said:
Precisely.

Why you could get rid of broadband, save yourself a bundle, and hogging up AT&T towers 24x7. Comeon now, they are running a business.
Click to expand...

Not sure if serious. Come on now, really? I get that they are running a business, but what does it matter to att how I use the data I'm already paying for?
 
AlphaHumanus said:
Not sure if serious. Come on now, really? I get that they are running a business, but what does it matter to att how I use the data I'm already paying for?
Click to expand...

Cause you are paying $30 for unlimited. There are people paying $200 for what 30GB? Obviously there data usage has priority over ours. So if we were using hotspot 24/7 and hogging up the towers, we would be getting more than we are paying for and those that pay more would be getting less.

I hate that I don't have hotspot, but Im okay with it because its a fair trade off. If I want to tether that badly I will dump unlimited.
 
AlphaHumanus said:
Not sure if serious. Come on now, really? I get that they are running a business, but what does it matter to att how I use the data I'm already paying for?
Click to expand...

Because the dirty little secret in the cellular industry is that they really don't do a great job in tracking your usage and getting onto your bill. That is the whole reason they are trying to move everyone to unlimited minutes and text.
 
Mlrollin91 said:
Cause you are paying $30 for unlimited. There are people paying $200 for what 30GB? Obviously there data usage has priority over ours. So if we were using hotspot 24/7 and hogging up the towers, we would be getting more than we are paying for and those that pay more would be getting less.

I hate that I don't have hotspot, but Im okay with it because its a fair trade off. If I want to tether that badly I will dump unlimited.
Click to expand...

I recently moved from VW to T-Mobile and have the unlimited text and data family on 3 iPhone 5S's. T-Mobile has hotspot available on theirs and I think they throttle you back after so much (5 GB?) hotspot data is used but I haven't tried to tether using their hotspot service yet.
 
Sean Dempsey said:
Before I upgraded my phones 3 weeks ago, I had a personal hotspot on a 3gig plan. I can't keep that?

What is the share everything plan? That sounds a lot better than $80 in data and only getting 1 hotspot plan.
Click to expand...

here's the mobile share plan info. I switched to this when it was first offered because tethering was included (before, I was cheating the system to get free tethering by rooting Android phones).

http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/data-plans.html#fbid=-WxthTVwo0T

basically, you pay $x for the data you want to share, then you pay a certain price per smartphone to access that data and get unlimited talk and text.
 
I think the phone carriers make it as difficult as possible to understand the plans and also to be able to compare plans between different carriers. They are so greedy.
 
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