AT&T Adds Limits To Your Unlimited Plan

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After all the bad press over throttling unlimited customers, AT&T has set new guidelines for customers that are in danger of being throttled. Thanks to dr.stevil for the heads up!

Do you have an unlimited data plan? If so, we have information to help you manage your account if you use more than 3GB, which means you are in the top 5% of data users in our network. If you have a 4G LTE Smartphone with monthly data usage over 5GB, you'll also be interested in this information. You can check your usage for this month by dialing *data# on your mobile phone. If you have one of our tiered data plans, this information will not affect you.
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AT&T should have thought all possibilities through before offering 'unlimited'. After all, they agreed to fork over all that iphone money to apple because they expected adoption to take off. If that was the case, they should have had these limits at the beginning. Seems pretty deceptive, but that's the way business works sometimes I guess. The big wigs are responsible for increasing the profit of the share holder, not giving customers a good experience.
 
That "top 5%" grows by the month. AT&T can't expect people only to check their email forever. Every day, more people discover Netflix, Shoutcast, etc.
 
i fail to see how it's legal for them to use the english word unlimited to describe a truly limited plan.

Does that mean I catn open up a restaurant selling the greasiest nastiest (hence most delicious) burgers and call them "Ultra healthy eco burgers"? If I take the AT&T approach and just totally bork the meaning of "healthy"

The only thing unlimited about AT&T's fucked up business is the amount of money they plan on making off you the consumer whore.
 
If you say something is unlimited, then that's what it should be. Not currently, nor plan to be, one of AT&T's customers, but promising one thing and later on turning around to say "Oh, we've adjusted that term" is deceptive.

I get that shareholders are important. If I pony up cash to help you along, it's not for free. At the same time, if something's been promised to a customer, it better damn well be given. Bad PR from customers could mean a greater drop in profits than from delivering on that promise.
 
FndTheRver said:
AT&T should have thought all possibilities through before offering 'unlimited'. After all, they agreed to fork over all that iphone money to apple because they expected adoption to take off. If that was the case, they should have had these limits at the beginning. Seems pretty deceptive, but that's the way business works sometimes I guess. The big wigs are responsible for increasing the profit of the share holder, not giving customers a good experience.
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They should of just kicked everyone off of unlimited when their contracts ended and forced everyone onto a tiered plan (maybe even at a slightly reduced cost for 'loyalty'). Instead they pissed of a lot of their fairly loyal customers and left themselves open to lawsuits. At least that way, some people still had the option of getting in on Verizon's Unlimited plan. Whoever the genius is that decided to handle it that way couldn't of thought it was a good idea.

I've never had many complaints with AT&T.. it's been pretty reliable along the east coast, the data speeds are usually great and customer service is helpful but this whole throttling thing has really left a bad taste in my mouth. When my contract ends in going to check out other carriers. It's just astounding how little regard they seem to have for their longterm customers
 
SO glad I got off of ATT when I did.

If they improved their craptastic network, then this wouldn't be such an issue.
 
fattypants said:
That "top 5%" grows by the month. AT&T can't expect people only to check their email forever. Every day, more people discover Netflix, Shoutcast, etc.
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I use my phone constantly, and stream music in the car (from spotify), but I don't usually stream netflix on my phone. Just don't watch movies much.

I just can't seem to reach more than about a gig a month at most.

6798846582_733c8aceca_o.jpg


While I totally disagree with something being sold as Unlimited, and then limited, its not an issue for me. At least not right now. In the future as more and more content rich apps become the norm, then maybe it will be.

At least now we know when we are being limited, and when the network is just being slow vs. the old method of just limiting whomever they please when they please without a firm specified limit.

So, at what speed do they cap the connection once you surpass 3GB?
 
What I find amusing is that they blame it onspectrum availability.

What, is there less spectrum in the U.S. as compared to Europe and Japan? :p
 
Unlimited access, not unlimited speeds, learn to differentiate people...
 
I've got Sprint and love it. They even have the iPhone now for those that prefer it. Their commercials always point out that they are the only true unlimited data carrier...hope it lasts. :(
 
Zarathustra[H];1038445262 said:
I use my phone constantly, and stream music in the car (from spotify), but I don't usually stream netflix on my phone. Just don't watch movies much.

I just can't seem to reach more than about a gig a month at most.

6798846582_733c8aceca_o.jpg


While I totally disagree with something being sold as Unlimited, and then limited, its not an issue for me. At least not right now. In the future as more and more content rich apps become the norm, then maybe it will be.

At least now we know when we are being limited, and when the network is just being slow vs. the old method of just limiting whomever they please when they please without a firm specified limit.

So, at what speed do they cap the connection once you surpass 3GB?
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interestingly enough, according to a thread I was reading earlier on HowardForums, they've seemed to have increased the throttled speeds a bit as well. One poster, who was being throttled, was getting speed test results around 350kbps.

enough to do basic stuff and stream low quality audio.
 
Aratech said:
I've got Sprint and love it. They even have the iPhone now for those that prefer it. Their commercials always point out that they are the only true unlimited data carrier...hope it lasts. :(
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The difference between Sprint and Verizon/AT&T LTE is night and day.
 
Aratech said:
I've got Sprint and love it. They even have the iPhone now for those that prefer it. Their commercials always point out that they are the only true unlimited data carrier...hope it lasts. :(
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Yeah, Im glad I stayed with sprint, I use my Evo and 4G tether almost every day, end up using almost 15-20Gb a month.. Havent heard one complaint, no throttling.. I also pray it stays this way
 
I see, so AT&T doesn't use the English definition of the word "unlimited" in their contracts, and instead makes up their own meanings and applies it to your account.

I'm sure they'll be please to know that when I signed the contract for 30 dollars per month for unlimited data, I consider a dollar to be a Mexican peso, I'm glad their contracts are open to such free interpretation.
 
Zarathustra[H];1038445262 said:
I use my phone constantly, and stream music in the car (from spotify), but I don't usually stream netflix on my phone. Just don't watch movies much.

I just can't seem to reach more than about a gig a month at most.

6798846582_733c8aceca_o.jpg


While I totally disagree with something being sold as Unlimited, and then limited, its not an issue for me. At least not right now. In the future as more and more content rich apps become the norm, then maybe it will be.

At least now we know when we are being limited, and when the network is just being slow vs. the old method of just limiting whomever they please when they please without a firm specified limit.

So, at what speed do they cap the connection once you surpass 3GB?
Click to expand...

I have an iphone and use netflix quite a bit and my data is still only around 1.5-2GB per month.
 
So, AT&T unlimited is really "unlimited". How nice.

I bet all the customers that got shifted into AT&T by their mergers are thrilled with their new overlords. Which reminds me, didn't AT&T get busted up because they were a monopoly? How the hell is it that they're able to gobble up all these smaller carriers and rebuild that monopoly all over again?
 
chockomonkey said:
Actually, capping speeds IS limiting access.

And if they just say 'Unlimited' well then it is their fault for not specifying.
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No, you can still access any website, will it be a pleasant experience? No but it's still unlimited access at a slow speed
 
Almost Unlimited™
Very Nearly Unlimited™
Approaching Total Unlimitedness™
Unlimited As Long As You Dont Use Too Much™


If an unlimited data plan means something other than maxed out bandwidth speeds sustained for the entire month, then it's not unlimited. This might be harsh and unrealistic, but it's the only solution to this type of issue. We're moving into an increasingly "streamed" internet lifestyle, streamed music, streamed HD movies, cloud based gaming, highly interactive websites. Putting caps on service is a step in the wrong direction.
 
I never understood metered billing for data. It doesn't work logically. Bandwidth isn't limited by a finite number.

I don't see why you cap high-usage users at 3-5GB when it would be perfectly fair to give equal bandwidth to all (that is divided by number of users on the tower.) If someone wants to download 30GB at 4AM, it won't effect anyone since data usage will be so low they can't hurt anyone else's speeds.

Otherwise, this is only a way for the telcos to charge overages, they need to be able to have the ability to charge people more than expected.
 
collegeboy69us said:
i fail to see how it's legal for them to use the english word unlimited to describe a truly limited plan.

Does that mean I catn open up a restaurant selling the greasiest nastiest (hence most delicious) burgers and call them "Ultra healthy eco burgers"? If I take the AT&T approach and just totally bork the meaning of "healthy"

The only thing unlimited about AT&T's fucked up business is the amount of money they plan on making off you the consumer whore.
Click to expand...

That is because AT&T say "unlimited" actually means "unlimited network access". They never said unlimited access at th same speed. It's shady, but they are not breaking any laws by doing it.
 
collegeboy69us said:
i fail to see how it's legal for them to use the english word unlimited to describe a truly limited plan.

Does that mean I catn open up a restaurant selling the greasiest nastiest (hence most delicious) burgers and call them "Ultra healthy eco burgers"? If I take the AT&T approach and just totally bork the meaning of "healthy"

The only thing unlimited about AT&T's fucked up business is the amount of money they plan on making off you the consumer whore.
Click to expand...
5-star post

Let's go into business together. I also have a large supply of 100% solid 24k gold bars of aluminum that I need to unload.
 
Exeodus said:
That is because AT&T say "unlimited" actually means "unlimited network access". They never said unlimited access at th same speed. It's shady, but they are not breaking any laws by doing it.
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Ok, so if they cut it to 1Mbps, still unlimited.

What about .5 Mbps? .1 Mbps? 56k? 28.8k? 14.4k? At what point would you say they were breaking the law?
 
This is nothing new. AT&T is actually increasing the amount of data you can use before they throttle you, so this is actually good news for anyone on these plans.
 
DejaWiz said:
Yeah, Verizon is starting to suck more and more as time goes on and Sprint has remained true to their word, IMO.
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Mine has only gotten faster recently... It's even technically faster than my Comcrap at times.
 
DejaWiz said:
Yeah, Verizon is starting to suck more and more as time goes on and Sprint has remained true to their word, IMO.
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Verizon has all but said that 3G is maxed out, and they rather not add more capacity to it than they have to. only 5% of their users use 4G and they rather move people there than put more capital into the 3G network. This is why they kept the double data promotion and mandated that all new smartphones are LTE. Even AT&T has made a similar move phone wise. Sprint will also be in a similar state, especially into next year when they can finally start to wind down Nextel.
 
canna said:
I see, so AT&T doesn't use the English definition of the word "unlimited" in their contracts, and instead makes up their own meanings and applies it to your account.

I'm sure they'll be please to know that when I signed the contract for 30 dollars per month for unlimited data, I consider a dollar to be a Mexican peso, I'm glad their contracts are open to such free interpretation.
Click to expand...

I'm always reminded of this.

q0jW1.jpg
 
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