AT&T will cap DSL and U-Verse internet, impose overage fees (update)

By Sean Hollister posted Mar 13th 2011 7:05PM
Breaking News




Ladies and gentlemen, the days of unlimited broadband may be numbered in the United States, and we're not talking wireless this time -- AT&T says it will implement a 150GB monthly cap on landline DSL customers and a 250GB cap on subscribers to U-Verse high speed internet starting on May 2nd. AT&T will also charge overage fees of $10 for every additional 50GB of data, with two grace periods to start out -- in other words, the third month you go over the cap is when you'll get charged. DSLReports says it has confirmation from AT&T that these rates are legitimate, and that letters will go out to customers starting March 18th.

How does AT&T defend the move? The company explains it will only impact two percent of consumers who use "a disproportionate amount of bandwidth," and poses the caps as an alternative to throttling transfer speeds or disconnecting excessive users from the service completely. Customers will be able to check their usage with an online tool, and get notifications when they reach 65 percent, 90 percent and 100 percent of their monthly rates.

We just spoke with AT&T representative Seth Bloom and confirmed the whole thing -- rates are exactly as described above, and the company will actually begin notifying customers this week. He also told us that those customers who don't yet have access to the bandwidth usage tool won't get charged until they do, and that AT&T U-Verse TV service won't count towards the GB cap.

Update: What prompted this change to begin with? That's what we just asked AT&T. Read the company's statement after the break.

We are committed to providing a great experience for all of our Internet customers. Less than 2 percent of our Internet customers could be impacted by this approach - those who are using a disproportionate amount of bandwidth. We will communicate early and often with these customers so they are well aware of their options before they incur any additional usage charges.

The top 2 percent of residential subscribers uses about 20 percent of the bandwidth on our network. Just one of these high-traffic users can utilize the same amount of data capacity as 19 typical households. Lopsided usage patterns can cause congestion at certain points in the network, which can slow Internet speeds and interfere with other customers' access to and use of the network. Our new plan addresses another concern: customers strongly believe that only those who use the most bandwidth should pay more than those who don't use as much. That's exactly what this does – and again, 98% of our customers will not be impacted by this.

i wonder how much bandwidth i use on an average month with gaming, downloading anime, watching netflix and hulu streams. gotta be quite a bit.

Looks like it's time to dismantle AT&T in to tiny little bits again before they send us all back to the day's of Prodigy & Compuserve based internet access.

There are a number of programs you can use to monitor that, but if you are with AT+T I would seriously consider leaving them and / or calling to complain about it. At the very least I would call them and see what you average is, as they would have that info. What types of plans they will be offering, etc., etc.. I just hope not everyone gets this idea.

You know the sad thing is that this is directly related to the big telcoms not upgrading their infrastructure to handle the future demands of activity. There are a number of studies that show North America is seriously direlct in their future plans for coming bandwidth requirements.

AT&T is the worst company ever.

Originally Posted by Bob369963

You know the sad thing is that this is directly related to the big telcoms not upgrading their infrastructure to handle the future demands of activity. There are a number of studies that show North America is seriously direlct in their future plans for coming bandwidth requirements.

That's because they too busy lining their coffers with more money than anyone could ever possibly need. My fear is that other providers will soon follow suite. Seriously what the hell's the point of improving speeds if they are going to cap how much bandwidth we can use. It's kind of like putting a faster engine in a car and then saying you can only go a 1/4 mile. While it's great for drag racing beyond that what's the point?

Yea, AT&T, you can go fuck yourself.

Luck for me AT&T isn't by me yet. They're close like not in my city(Madison) yet. Cleveland has it but not city.

We have AT&T in our house, DSL at that, and it blows.

I have Charter Pipeline in my room, which happens to be Cable. The cable is 25 down/2 up. AT&T, again, can suck my nuts :).

I don't give a shit about AT&T. I'm waiting for Fios to finish installing their stuff.

AT&T has been rated, on multiple occasions at that, to be the worst, if not one of the worst companies in the US, if not the world. They have TERRIBLE customer service and equally mind boggling quality.

They need to innovate or parish.

My cellphone is with AT&T. But I don't have a smartphone and I don't text yet so I don't need a data plan. I'm thinking of switching when my contract is up again.

Originally Posted by ErikStenger

I don't give a shit about AT&T. I'm waiting for Fios to finish installing their stuff.

I can live with Time Warner for now but I sure would like to see Fios in the Cincinnati area.

I had Time Warner. I just got sick of the bill going up almost every month for no reason. $151 for basic cable, medium speed internet and phone. It started at $90.

Originally Posted by ErikStenger

I had Time Warner. I just got sick of the bill going up almost every month for no reason. $151 for basic cable, medium speed internet and phone. It started at $90.

Yea it's not cheap I pay around $240 a month but I have premium expanded tier, digital phone and Road Runner Turbo plus I pay for extra for 10Mb/s upload speed because even with RR Turbo you only get 1 Mb/s... They must be laughing all the way to the bank.