Sprint tried that for minutes in the past. It tanked. Turns out people don't like their bills fluctuating month to month and can understand overage charges more than they can understand variable monthly rates.
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More Details on AT&T's Data Plan Changes for iPhone and iPad
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Sprint tried that for minutes in the past. It tanked. Turns out people don't like their bills fluctuating month to month and can understand overage charges more than they can understand variable monthly rates.
Jailbreak. Purchase MyWi for $10.
problem with this is...you're unable to upgrade to a new phone in the future.
I would agree, there is no reason not to allow video chat now. In fact AT&T is likely hoping not to make the same mistake twice (or 3 times since they did make the same mistake again back in April). Smartphone data plans were originally set unlimited because no one actually used data on smart phones before the iPhone. Other phones have video chat no one actually uses today. i am sure AT&T believes people will actually use video chat on an iPhone.
why? You can keep your $30/unlimited plan even if you upgrade, and there hasn't been an un-jailbreakable iphone yet.
Charging you a tethering fee of $20 just to share - with a complimentary device - a rationed parcel of data for which you've already paid is criminal. Imagine if Comcast charged you $20 extra every month for every additional computer you had sharing your connection via your in-house network. People wouldn't stand for it.
Will they stand for AT&T doing the same thing? I hope there's a class action lawsuit over this.
Wireless carriers suck.
Will they stand for AT&T doing the same thing? I hope there's a class action lawsuit over this.
Wireless carriers suck.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
I appreciate your vision. However, I don't think AT&T cares enough about these things to "do the right thing". It seems like everyone complains about AT&T service and costs at one time or another (or all the time). Poor PR? I can't think of examples of "good PR" associated with AT&T; it seems like they live in a state of poor PR. If so, what difference does a little more make?
Against "cheapest, simplest," they changed the plan now because they deemed it likely to be more profitable to them to do so. So "cheapest" is probably washed out by "added profit" (and then some). "Simplest" is the better argument, but greed usually trumps service, or doing the right thing, etc... just about every time.
If they cared about PR, or were worried about "cheapest" or "simplicity" they would have made this change and simply announced that those in by June 7 would continue to enjoy that plan for some period of time. As dumb as they sometimes look, I'm sure they were smart enough to consider this kind of reaction and perception, yet still they chose to do it anyway.
Again, I'm with you on what they should do. I just don't expect them to do that, nor be forced there by threats of legal action, class action, or negative publicity. To get that kind of deal back probably involves the masses showing AT&T that they've had it with this kind of thing, and that they won't buy cell service from AT&T unless they give them that kind of deal. Short of that, I see little chance.
And unfortunately, I don't see the masses caring enough to take that action either. Soon AT&T & Apple will announce record sales growth again, including a nice additional surge from iPad 3G sales.
What was P.T. Barnum's most famous quote? They'll be plenty of those to replace anyone who quits AT&T over this change of service.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
As I pointed out, I'm a lawyer
Do you want the case then? And given your expertise, what's the most money you could imagine that could come from this and end up in each claimants pocket?
Jailbreak. Purchase MyWi for $10.
Worth serious consideration. What are the odds of AT&T sniffing this out and terminating your service?
For ethical reasons I can't take the case, and I can't answer the question.
We shall indeed... but I think the primary reason they're changing the plan is to A, allow for a cheaper data plan to acquire more customers in advance of the platform opening up to other carriers, and B, punish users who use their jailbroken phones to tether with computers and use many many gigs of data. Though who would want to tether for extended periods of times is entirely beyond me, since the upload speeds for 3G are so dogskit slow.
Ironically of course, they're not encouraging people to "play by the rules" by charging such a ridiculous fee for tethering. I'm aslo of a mind that said fee is criminal, and will be jailbreaking my new iPhone as soon as ever I can.
You think AT&T is required to provide you tethering for free?
I already explained if they did this they would have to raise everyone's bill up $5-$10 a month.
Screw you if you think I want to pay for you to get tethering. So you save $10 and I pay $10 and you are the only one getting a benefit.
No thanks. Pay for your own usage.
There is nothing illegal about any of this... and good luck with your class action suit. At least an iPad case would not be instantly dismissed, unlike your idea.
That is not very solid advance. The likelihood of them doing it now after all this changes increases significantly.
When they get done with charging overages to some people on the unlimited account, they will be begging to get a $25 2 gig account with $10 a gig overages.
how are you paying for someone else's usage? you get to pay for the contract you agreed upon. if you don't want to use more data, you don't but that doesn't mean you're paying for someone's unlimited usage.
And all of that had a big asterisk caveat with it of "NO CONTRACT".
You can sue for whatever you want, however what you want to sue for his that AT&T had some obligation to offer you the same value of service forever, which is not reasonable by any standard. Not to mention AT&T has nothing to do with the sale of the device, Apple sells the device.
I don't know how you as a lawyer are successfully going to convince people you thought "no contract" meant the terms would stay the same forever.
Seriously I have to explain this again?
If they included tethering for FREE, the price for every user of data would have to be raised to cover the costs of those who use tethering.
That means I would have to pay more for service, just because of something YOU want to do.
So instead they are making it so YOU have to pay for it because you are using it, and not me.
the whole point is to get rid of the really heavy users since they are money losers no matter how much they pay
No.
Regardless of whether you tether or not, if you have the datapro plan, it is 2GB of data. It shouldn't matter to you whether i use my 2GB to tether or watch youtube on my iphone.
AT&T is providing my set amount of data. They shouldn't care how i use that data. It doesn't affect them in any differently if i use my internet on my phone or tether my phone to a laptop to use the internet .
This is like buying a gas for my car and the gas company charging me more if I am going to drive it on a highway instead of ordinary roads.
Trust me, it is just as frustrating for us to get this very simple point into the heads of people like you.
So a bunch of guys buy AXE and 15 beautiful women don't come running to mob them they can sue because there was a contract that wearing AXE drives women mad. Yeah right.
start/stop functionality is still being provided. You are muddling the issues. ATT is still providing a mechanism to start/stop/start contracts on the phone. They are still providing a "low" and "high" balance contracts.
Your burden of proof is that they made some explicit statement in the advertisement not that the specific terms of $30/unlimited contract was offered, but that the specific contract would be offered in perpetuity. They made no such claim.
A contract doesn't have to be in writing, but it must be expressed. Your attempt is one to "read between the lines" and make the claim that there were implied terms of perpetuity when absolutely nothing was said about the specific two plans being locked in place forever.
https://www.macrumors.com/2010/04/28/atandt-posts-fact-sheet-regarding-ipad-3g-data-service/
Commonsense says that if they only have two plans then the wording will say if have plan A can switch to plan B. The primary purpose of that is to illustrate you can switch to the other, higher/lower budget plan. That still exists. In no way does that assert guarantees that those plans will exist forever. You'd have a case if they said "over the lifetime of your device you can switch between either of these two specific plans." Nobody said that.
They've met the good faith and fair dealing aspect. Anyone who gets on board the change in terms, which they announced widely before taking effect,
can keep they unlimited until they cancel.
They also offer a higher data balance contract above the lowest one at a rate that approximately the same as before (cheaper in fact). It is a balance that covers 80% of there customers who are not bandwidth hogs. (so 2GB vs 5GB/a.k.a. "unlimited" makes no material difference). Most who are bandwidth hogs would have already busted the cap of the smaller plan and would have switched to unlimited by now anyway.
Anyone with an iPad 3G can do it instantly right now. Have been able to do it since the 3G iPads shipped. Any users that chose not to by June 7 has had ample opportunity to switch. If you choose not to buy a lottery ticket then you don't win the lottery. You can't come later saying those were my favorite numbers. If a car goes on sale, is advertised widely, and you snooze until the sale is over you can't get the same price later.
Would be quite different if there had been no window to take advantage of it, but there has been for over 30 days. That is an incredibly weak claim that have not had opportunity when one of advertisements' principle claims was that you can switch whenever you wanted to or needed to.
How can they possibly have a contract with Apple when Apple does not provide the service. The sign up application is an app. It also still works. The only possible contract you can have for celluar service is with a cell service provider. Apple has put an app on the iPad to start/stop service. It is still there. Apple didn't bill you nor provide the service, they just install the app. They are good.
They have money so I'm sure some ambulance chaser is going to try loop them in. However, they just follow the biggest pot of money. That is not all that surprising.
Once more: I didn't say forever. But it didn't even last long enough for us to use the feature even ONCE. Forever is too extreme, but 0 times is equally ridiculous. They promised we could activate for 30 days, deactivate for 30 days, and then reactivate. In exchange for this promise we gave them money. They changed the terms so that no one could do this even a single time, after they got our money.
A contract is a binding exchange of promises. They broke their promise.
There is likely no statistics to back that up. The flaws in you analogy is that ATT has an expectation that most folks on the 2GB plan will not use all 2GB. They are selling on a statistical model that there will be a certain distribution curve on actual data utilization. (otherwise there would be a strict $/exact-bytes-used like a gas/electric meter ). People who tether to laptops use more data on average (more than one device pulling data through a single source is not very likely to consume as much as just one).
ATT probably has enough info at this point to indicate that iPad users consume data more in the distribution that laptop/modem folks do than iPhone folks do.
As long as there is a statistical difference between in consumption between the devices connected then there is a justification to modify pricing.
That is not a representation of fact. It is nothing more than advertising/sales "puffery" (that's a fantastic car right there!!). Telling people they have the ability to have a certain data plan with the right to turn it on and off at any time is a completely different situation. Now i don't think AT&T has breached a contract---there are possible issues of false advertising and other similar statutes.
You're losing the forest for the trees. Sure, start/stop is allowed, but if you stop, you lose the deal they started must one month ago. And they didn't say they'd provide "low" and "high" balance contracts. They offered a 250MB and unlimited contract. BIG difference.
And there is no need that the contract be offered in perpetuity. If you think it is a slam dunk that the courts wouldn't find that AT&T is required to keep this plan for a "reasonable" period of time, you either don't practice law or are a law student---because this situation is NOT black and white.
You're combating arguments that aren't being made. No one says this plan should exist forever. But changing it 1 month after it was in existance is nothing less than unreasonable.
No, they'll need to lock into a plan and not change it. That is not the deal. I'm kind of shocked that someone can say a company can advertise a service plan only to change it significantly one month later and deem that action consistant with good faith and fair dealing.
You don't see a difference between an ad that states explicit terms, and an ad that expresses unbelievable puffery?
1) I don't have to show they said in perpetuity. I have to show that it couldn't even happen ONCE because they stopped it so soon
2) They are NOT providing start/stop/start where each "start" corresponds to $30 for unlimited service. They NEVER provided start/stop/start. At best they provided start/stop.
You are wrong. Contracts may be express or implied. If you promise me something (start/stop/start of unlimited in exchange for $30) and I reasonably rely on that to my detriment (buying an iPad, activating it for a month, and giving you money), an implied contract is formed by promissory estoppel. Further, every contract has implied terms, such as the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing.
Quit making that up. I have repeatedly pointed out that "forever" is not an issue. The issue is it was physically impossible to start/stop/start even ONE TIME.
No they haven't. The deal was we can cancel and return to it. That was a term of the contract. They have breached that term by not allowing us to exercise our right to do that EVEN ONE TIME.
No person has had the ability to start/stop/start.
Because they are acting as AT&T's agent, they are advertising it, etc. You are inventing legal safe harbors that do not exist.
Wait. Because AT&T thinks i won't use all of my 2GB, they have a right to charge me more for using it in a way that will use more of my already alloted (and paid for) data? That is absolutely rediculous.
And actually, the analogy is quite apt if i were to reverse it. Considering people get better gas mileage on the highway, maybe gas companies should charge more for using their gas on highways.