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AT&T Communications United States Verizon

Verizon, AT&T Made $600 Million in Overage Fees Alone in 2016 (dslreports.com) 78

Posted by msmash from the fool-me-once dept.
A new study claims that Verizon and AT&T made $600 million alone in 2016 just on overage fees. And while both telcos unveiled new plans that let you avoid $15 per gigabyte overages in exchange for just being throttled (Verizon's "safety mode" and AT&T's Mobile Share Advantage) the study by Nerd Wallet found that thanks to buried surcharges and other fees, users on these new plans may not save much money. DSLReports adds: That said, the report claims whether or not you save money under these new plans depends on your (or your family's) usage behavior. "If you're on an average-sized plan and your data overages exceed 8GB per year, choosing one of the new plans will save you money, according to NerdWallet and My Data Manager's analysis," says the report. "The individual Verizon Plan will save you money if you have an average plan, even if you never go over your data limit," it continues. "Otherwise, the new Verizon plans and AT&T's Mobile Share Advantage plans won't save you money. In fact, most consumers on legacy plans would be better off sticking to them and paying the occasional overage fee."
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Verizon, AT&T Made $600 Million in Overage Fees Alone in 2016 More

Verizon, AT&T Made $600 Million in Overage Fees Alone in 2016

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  • so....let's fine them $12million (Score:5, Insightful)

    by turkeydance ( 1266624 ) on Wednesday October 12, 2016 @11:53AM (#53062763)
    they'll never notice

  • Fee Subcription (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I'm paying so much I don't even remember what I'm paying for anymore...

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by houstonbofh ( 602064 )
      If you understood your bill, there is no way you would pay that much. Confusion is intended. That way they can say $30 a month, knowing you will still pay the $70... ("It is all taxes and fees...")

      • Re:Fee Subcription (Score:4, Informative)

        by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Wednesday October 12, 2016 @12:15PM (#53062955)

        The telephone tax is one example on where a Progressive Tax became a regressive tax over time.
        Back when the Tax was enacted Telephone service was only for the rich, however now it has became a necessary tool for operation in society. So the poor people need telephone service too yet they are paying extra taxes on it.

    • Re: (Score:1, Offtopic)

      by soapdude ( 2568589 )
      Check out Google Fi. I switched to it 3 months ago and it's awesome. I pay $20/mo for unlimited talk/text + $10/gb data. No overages, just prorated. You use 1.002Gb? That's $10.02. Simple. Plus, if you are on WiFi, it just uses the Wifi for everything, including phone calls and text.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by movdqa ( 1122661 )
        A friend switched to this recently and he's happy with the price and coverage. He used to be on one of the AT&T MVNOs.

  • Of course (Score:5, Insightful)

    by somenickname ( 1270442 ) on Wednesday October 12, 2016 @12:07PM (#53062889)

    The options are A) Spend $600 million to upgrade the infrastructure so there is enough bandwidth. B) Gain $600 million by not upgrading the infrastructure and just charge more for people who try to use it. This seems like a pretty easy decision for a business and, as long as all competitors choose option "B", there is no real risk of losing customers.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Jawnn ( 445279 )

      The options are A) Spend $600 million to upgrade the infrastructure so there is enough bandwidth. B) Gain $600 million by not upgrading the infrastructure and just charge more for people who try to use it. This seems like a pretty easy decision for a business and, as long as all competitors choose option "B", there is no real risk of losing customers.

      But, but the free market... (insert dipshit Rand fan-boy whine here). I think we can all agree that consumers are getting screwed here. The question is what are we going to do about it? Churn is part of their business model. We could all switch carriers and nothing would change, so STFU about competition. It doesn't exist. Next suggestion?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by DarkOx ( 621550 )

        There is no free market when the government 'gets' to license spectrum. Quite honestly I think it should be all made to work CB like, there should be maximum power and set of rules that everyone must follow but anyone should be able to use the spectrum.

        That will give us lots of choice, but also will probably preclude the operation of a national network, and greatly reduce reliability. Oh well

        • There is no free market when the government 'gets' to license spectrum.

          And doubly so then they consider it "competition" when there are TWO suppliers:
          - With ONE supplier (monopoly) the incentive is to charge as much as possible - until you're driving away more in customer revenue from people who do without or with less than you gain from higher prices.
          - With TWO suppliers (duopoly) the market forces lead rational players to adjust prices to divide the market roughly evenly and continue to ch

      • Actually, competition does exist. I know I'm going to sound like a paid shill, but hell with it. Google has Project Fi, which only works with recent Nexus Phones but switches between wifi, the T-Mobile network, and the Sprint network based on connectivity. It's $20 per month plus $10 per GB, plus state and federal fees.

        I use Ting.com. Ting users can use Sprint or T-Mobile on a per-phone basis - one of my sons has a phone that uses Sprint, the other son and I have phones that use T-Mobile. The select
        • I've been using Virgin Mobile for years and it is 35$ month with 5GB. The only problem with VM is there aren't any family plans, so it's best if you just need a single phone.
          • Thanks for mentioning it. That's a better deal than Ting for someone that uses lots of data.

            I used Virgin Mobile about seven years ago, and at that time their smart phone selection was awful and the Sprint network they piggyback on was poor in my area. I see that today they have the iPhone 6 and 7 and the Samsung Galaxy S7, so the phone selection is no longer an issue. And Sprint cell phone reception has improved considerably in my area in that time, so that's not an issue either.

        • You're leaving out an extremely important point about Ting: you don't have to use their phones. You can buy any Sprint or T-Mobile phone you want and use it. Personally, I like the Galaxy S4 and S5 phones (I now have an S5 as the prices are about $150 for a really nice used one; the S4s are now under $100 for nice ones); they're still getting updates and are flagship phones. They also have great Otterbox cases available at cheap prices (because they're several years old now).

          I have 3 phones on my Ting pl

    • The options are A) Spend $600 million to upgrade the infrastructure so there is enough bandwidth.

      I think the fact that the telcos are making so much money off of 'overages' proves that the bandwidth is already there and no infrastructure improvement is needed. If the customers were trying to go over the artificial limits imposed by their contracts and were unable to do so because the network infrastructure was so poor that their connections would never have the bandwidth to allow customers to exceed the limits, then we would need infrastructure improvement.

      Instead, we see that it is trivially easy for

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by swb ( 14022 )

        Well, it demonstrates the bandwidth is there for *some* customers. We don't know about the customers who heed warning texts and self-throttle.

        I'd be curious to know what percentage of customers who pay overages do so repeatedly (more often than not having them imposed) without doing anything about it, either moving to a higher tier plan or self-limiting their usage.

        I can see an argument where it's cheaper to pay an overage 1-2 times per year vs paying for a higher tier you wouldn't consistently need, but i

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          Well, it demonstrates the bandwidth is there for *some* customers. We don't know about the customers who heed warning texts and self-throttle.

          I'd be curious to know what percentage of customers who pay overages do so repeatedly (more often than not having them imposed) without doing anything about it, either moving to a higher tier plan or self-limiting their usage.

          I can see an argument where it's cheaper to pay an overage 1-2 times per year vs paying for a higher tier you wouldn't consistently need, but it

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sootman ( 158191 )

      Luckily, not all companies choose Option B. (Or at least, not all at once.) This is the #1 reason I moved from AT&T to T-Mobile 3 years ago. On AT&T, if I went over, they charged a TON for the next small clump of data. I think my plan was $30/mo for X GB, and if I went over, it was about $15 or $20 for two-tenths of X GB more -- something ridiculous like that. And it wasn't optional -- if you went over, you paid.

      On T-M, besides giving me more data for less money in the first place AND including teth

  • I refuse to use either company. Suckers!!!

  • everyone does it. you pick 5% to 10% of your customer base and get them to pay more $$$ to you for some service

    i don't use that much data so i don't really care about your right to watch youtube or netflix 24 hours a day everywhere you go

    • WRONG T-Mobile does not (Score:4, Interesting)

      by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Wednesday October 12, 2016 @12:22PM (#53063017)

      I left Verizon specifically because of the upsetting and ridiculous extra charges for things like simple use of international data.

      T-Mobile really doesn't pull that crap. In fact once I ran out of tethering data allowance (even though I still had data left on the plan) and T-Mobile had no way to pay them more money to increase the tethering allowance... you can bet Verizon would have had $ome way to accomplish that (BTW that tethering portion thing seems to be gone now).

      I can also use data roaming internationally with NO FEE WHATSOEVER.

      The real test is in the bill though, and mine has stayed the same from month to month despite traveling, some international and some not...

      On a side note T-Mobile seems to actually spend money on infrastructure as over time the reception across a number of locations has improved as has the network speed. Still not up to Verizon levels out East but not too bad either.

      • except the new monthly plans cost just as much as AT&T and verizon and t-mobile has said they are going to do away with the current plans in the next year or two

        • I honestly do not care what the base rate is, what I care about is that I can expect to do a lot of things with he service and not have my bill fluctuate wildly. My Verizon bills could be 2x-3x what I was normally paying due to a variety of reasons.

          We'll see what they replace plans with but I don't see them nickel and dining customers the way Verizon did.

          • some of us have a life outside our phone and being able to pre-load facebook and instagram videos everywhere we go

            • Moron, I do have a life outside my phone as well (I'm pretty sure substantially moreso than you) which is why I like a plan I don't have to wonder about every month.

              To me a smartphone or data plan is not abut others reaching me, but about empowering me to find out anything I like at a moments notice. Sorry you can't make out the distinction and choose to live as a literal subhuman.

  • When we were on vacation to a nice cabin on a lake that had no Internet, I tethered off my phone. Just my wife & I doing normal surfing in the evenings & yes I knew I would go over my 6 gig cap... It occurred to me that I am paying top download the ads on all websites.

    While I understand websites aren't free & other than Google, no one is really making much money with these ads. But it appears I will have to go with a adblocker now. Fucking Comcrap starts their cap on us next month. I wonder how much data is being chewed up by advertisements?

    BTW fuck them & their throttling plans.

    • Re:How much do all the ads on webpages cost? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by fahrbot-bot ( 874524 ) on Wednesday October 12, 2016 @12:33PM (#53063123)

      When we were on vacation to a nice cabin on a lake that had no Internet, I tethered off my phone. Just my wife & I doing normal surfing in the evenings

      You were vacation with your wife, in a cabin by a lake and you both spent the evenings surfing the web? Dude...

      • they were looking for new positions to try

      • OK fine, good shot. But you understand, the mosquitoes were out in force do to recent rains so after sunset we were chased inside.

        The cabin was a payoff for computer repairs. A friend of mine has a few businesses & suffers from the usual computer problems & I've been fixing them for years. I used to get gym membership but he sold it.

        • I get it, especially if you two weren't alone in the evenings. But I'd like to offer the following to remind you to always try and find special time together - and a cabin by a lake seems like a good place:

          Remember Sue... [tumblr.com]
          - Rick

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward

        When we were on vacation to a nice cabin on a lake that had no Internet, I tethered off my phone. Just my wife & I doing normal surfing in the evenings

        You were vacation with your wife, in a cabin by a lake and you both spent the evenings surfing the web? Dude...

        Why would you take your wife on vacation?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Calydor ( 739835 )

      In my experience, a good half of your total data usage goes to stuff like advertisements, Facebook buttons, Twitter links and the like. The net is full of so much crud because no one cares about bandwidth anymore, it's just something magical that is infinite and always there.

      When you start seeing people using 20 MB gifs as signatures on game forums, that's really a wake up call for how much bandwidth you're wasting.

    • It's worse than the obnoxious ad bars, just about every news website these days automatically plays embedded videos. If you check your browser cache you will find it having anywhere from 500MB to serveral GB of crap. AdBlock doesn't block it all either. I would expect that NoScript is your best bet, or using a text-only browser if they still exist. As for the Comcast data caps, I live in Illinois where they have been testing the caps for years now, only ever reached the old 250GB cap once back when I was do

      • I would expect that NoScript is your best bet, or using a text-only browser if they still exist.

        NoScript is the only way to go. Lynx will just lead to frustration if you are to try to browse any modern page due to the amount of JS used to render.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by kruug ( 4451395 )

      But it appears I will have to go with a adblocker now.

      Careful, most only remove the div/object from sight, they don't stop them from actually downloading.

      • But it appears I will have to go with a adblocker now.

        Careful, most only remove the div/object from sight, they don't stop them from actually downloading.

        Really, I did not know that. Do you or anyone else have any suggestions as to what to use? Does NoScipt block it all? I've seen some sites that won't allow you to see their content if you block their ads. As long as that does not proliferate, no big deal, I'll just not use those sites.

  • That seems like a really small number on a per person basis. I'm guessing between them they have 60 million customers, so this is (average wise) less than a dollar a month for their average consumer.

    • I was thinking something similar. It's a lot of money, but it's probably a small % of their annual budget.

      In context. $100,000 would be a lot of money to me, but to the US government budget it would be rounded down to $0.

  • Pre-paid plan.

    It just makes so much sense. Pay up front and when your account runs out of money, the service stops. No overage. It's impossible.

    I have gone to the same strategy with banking. I used a pre-paid account. It's impossible to overdraft.

  • I switched from a legacy Verizon plan to the new plans and got the same data for $4 less. I also have the Safety Mode and Carryover Data. So lower cost, more data, more flexibility. How you'll do with the new plans or the old plans depends on your usage and how their fees are structured. BTW, we're about 23 days into the cycle and we haven't used an data. I'm generally amazed at how much cellular data people use today.

    • I called Verizon this past Monday and while discussing my desire to switch to the new plan the rep advised me that their is a $10 discount for the old plans if you are on a device payment plan which makes the old plan cost less than the new one. Difference of $5 less, if you don't have that discount currently being applied and are on a device payment plan then the new plan will appear to cost $5 less than the old one. I'm still going to switch to the new plan and pay $5 more to get the rollover data since I

  • How did they come up with these numbers? Verizon charges $15/GB overage in 1 GB blocks a $26 overage is impossible 1.7GB overage would be 2 1GB overage blocks so $15 + $15 =$30

    • This is one of the things I'm extremely happy about with Google Fi (just a user, no affiliation).

      At $10/GB, the data may be a bit pricey -- but all data is prorated. I don't use data much at all, so my $30/mo. plan (unlimited call, 1GB data) is almost always *less* than $30/mo. Plus, international data is the same price.
  • My wife and I had the AT&T Family Share Plan with 2GB/month of data. Here lately, we came very close to to 2GB cap, and ran over a couple of times. So, after the AT&T Mobile Share Advantage plans came out, we switched to a 3GB/month plan and are saving $15.00/month on our bill. Say what you want, but this was a good, money-saving, deal for us.
  • FLAT fee including tax. Less than 48/month, unlimited talk/text, 6gb a month and I never use more than 4-5GB a month. No this fee, that fee.
  • because i'm familiar with the way americans mangle words, i understand "overage" to be a fee charged when someone goes over their bandwidth allocation. is that right? or is it a fee charged for being over the age of 18? perhaps they will eventually penalize users for NOT using their entire allocation each month. someone notify Chris Hansen, we've got underage criminals here.

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