AT&T: Get off our TDMA network and pay us more money!

Is there anyone actually still using the old AT&T (Blue) Wireless’ TDMA wireless network? Well, there must be, because AT&T is stickin’ it to those AT&T TDMA network subscribers that are taking advantage of those super-low legacy rate-plans. They’re trying to make the monthly savings less appealing by charging TDMA users an extra $10 per month. Boy Genius got some user reports that AT&T upped their “F You” fee from $4.99 to $9.99 per month to try and “convince” these TDMA subscribers to move off of AT&T Blue’s old network and get with the times on the new AT&T GSM network.

The fee only applies to “Blue” users on the TDMA. Those on the AT&T Blue’s old GSM network have nothing to worry about – aside from the inevitable network shutdown, that is.

[Via: Boy Genius Report]

About The Author

Will Park

Will hails from The City of Angels - Los Angeles, California. He spends his time playing with his numerous gadgets and looking forward to seeing what future holds for mobile technology. An avid promoter of a fully "digital" life, he promotes the widespread adoption of truly mobile, paper-less living. He dreams of the day when he can go completely digital. No more snail mail, paper receipts, bound books, notepads/spiral notebooks, credit cards, hard currency. He's a digital warrior - fighting for the converged life. He is an idealist and a realist - he has a perfect view of what the world should be but knows that the world is not perfect. Can we ever hope to see Will's dream become reality? We'll see...

B

Do you have any information about FCC rulings that may have motivated AT&T to charge these extra charges?
Customer service reps insist that there is, but they can not supply any name or detail of a law or ruling.

Personally I think that it is time to persue a class action lawsuit to collect incurred costs from AT&T.
Kevin

Hello,

I am one of the people still “using” the old TDMA service. I am honestly not a big cell phone user, suprising for a 24 year old. MY rate plan was obtained in the summer of 2003. It was a business local plan that included 60 minutes a month for 16.99. Even when I did go over slightly it it was cheaper than paying for the base plans that are now available. I have been paying the additional 4.99/mo TDMA charge and have rcvd notices that they are now upping it to $9.99/mo in October. Additionally, I just rcvd a notice that the $16.99 was a special plan and will now be bumped up to $24.99/mo. That comes out to $34.99/mo, which is a doubling of my rate plan!! I called customer svc to complain and ask for credits of these fees but to no avail. All they wanted to do was switch me over to their GSM network. AT&T coverage actually sucks near my house so there is no point of switching over. Add to this the lousy customer service I received and there is no way I would stay with AT&T. I’ve loved receiving my monthly snail mail from John Ventura – Director of Business Marketing with the latest and greatest offer for me to upgrade my phone. Unfortunately for AT&T, I am going to be switching to Verizon Wireless. What makes this even more comical is that not only am I switching from my 16.99/mo voice only plan but I am going to a data/voice plan for around $50/mo. Maybe if AT&T took better care of their customers it would be $50 more in their pocket every month. Do they really care?? No. They won’t say how many customers are left – but it can’t be many. They say that 99% of their customer minutes are from GSM and that TDMA users really don’t user their phones. Doing a little math – they have roughly 60M subscribers. 60M times 1% give us 600,000 people. I would say it’s fairly generous to estimate that TDMA subscribers are using 25% of the minutes of GSM subscribers. 25% multiplied by 600,000 gets us to 150,000 subscribers. I would say this is really generous and that the true numbers of subscribers is in the tens of thousands. Any thoughts?
B

Well after spending about 20 hours chatting with AT&T’s customer service (20 hours x $20 = $400 hum I think it would have been cheaper to give me a phone)I still cannot get them to grant me a GSM phone without a two year contract. AT&T demands at least a 1 year contract, even if I purchase my own new phone. Can anyone other than me smell a rat? So, I upgraded since I could no longer use my old phone. As part of the perks they offered me a credit roughly equal to the total of the $4.99 & $9.99 / month fees they had charged me. They also offered me 200 anytime bonus minutes monthly if I would sign a contract. I don’t know if I will stay with them or not. Granted, they finally beat everyone elses deals on new service, but honestly they made me angry by attempting to force me into a contract after 7 years of being a loyal customer. Just thought I would pass on my best deal so that others might have an idea of what they could shoot for in negotiations.

I recieved a Nokia 6085 flip phone. It does a good job on signal reception & transmission, as good as my 5165. The screen is difficult during daylight hours though. Nokia sells a charger adapter for $9.99 that will allow the use of the 5165′s chargers. Just food for thought for anyone looking to upgrade.

KEVIN,
Well let’s see, 150,000 customers x $50/mo = $6 million/year loss. I think someone ought to go back to management school and learn customer service!