The problem here is that AT&T has, in true reactionary fashion, gone way overboard in their response. In an effort to curb people consistently using 10 or more GB month-over-month-over-month, they've seemingly set the bar too low, and are enforcing it in a draconian fashion. Some of these people were undoubtedly tethering without the proper plans, while others were simply streaming Pandora or YouTube over 3G all day, every day, but now everyone has been sent to the principal's office as a result.
The cutoff isn't 2GB. I used almost 2.2GB last month, and I haven't seen any degradation in speed. True, last month was an exceptional month because it was when I turned on iTunes Match, but I also usually didn't come within spitting distance of 2GB. And I haven't heard of anyone being cut off because they only used 384 kilobytes (KB) of data. One person complained of being throttled when he hit 1.5GB of data, but he did so in less than a week, putting him on target for a 6GB month.
When AT&T created the unlimited data plan, there wasn't Pandora on mobile devices. Or YouTube. There also wasn't an iPhone, an HSPA+ network, or LTE in select cities.
Hbalfour wrote:
I think it is so pathetic how At&t has been able to successfully use divide and conquer amongst is customers.
How can you accuse a customer of being abusive??? When I signed up for unlimited data five years ago no one told me that there was a cap on my limit.
And for the record (to the AT&T corporate supporters) I am no "abuser". I don't tether. I rarely stream videos outside of a few videos here and there. I surf the net daily and I do download updates frequently. Yet my speed, after two weeks into the billing cycle went from 5.84mbps to now .3mbps. That's criminal! They are lying so everyone can be forced to go to a tiered data plan and make more money. Especially off of overages.
We must also define the word unlimited:
" un·lim·it·ed/ˌənˈlimitid/Adjective 1. Not limited or restricted in terms of number, quantity, or extent."
"To those saying that AT&T isn’t breeching the “unlimited” nature of the “unlimited data plan” by throttling it’s top users, you are wrong. Throttling is, by definition, a means by which ATT seeks to “limit” the data a user on an unlimited data plan can pull. The intent is to reduce the amount of data being pulled by unlimited data plans – thus the intent is, in fact, to “limit” which is the opposite of “unlimited” which is in breech of unlimited data plan contracts."
Plus we must look at the first initial lie put out. Customers were told that only the top 5% of users would be effected. However when I called AT&T they told me the cap was 2.0 GB. So what is it? 2gbs or the top 5%? Speaking of which how is AT&T able to determine who falls in the 5% when that number is dynamic???
If AT&T did not want it's users using large increments of data they should never have created an unlimited data plan. The word unlimited is highly misleading.
It is wrong to make customers feel as if they are the victims when in fact AT&T should have used it's money to build more towers and satellites to accommodate the incoming demand.
Rather than take accountability for a problem they fostered they have in turn blamed the customer. If a customer has an unlimited data plan fellow customers have no right to tell other customers what they should be doing with their data. None of us were told what was considered "abuse" or a maximum limit.
And all of you in support of this sound stupid. AT&T is the same corporation that gave our government permission to tap our phone lines without our knowledge in exchange for highly lucrative government contracts during the Bush administration. This is about right for AT&T.
They were also voted the worst in customer service for the third year in a row. For some reason I'm not buying AT&T's story about the average customer uses less than 250mb's of data per month. They can lie and charge us anything and that'a something all of us should be worried about....
