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I don't understand the move. Seems it would be ultimately cheaper(support, potential legal, churn, etc) and harbor more good will to just flag these old accoun

I don't understand the move. Seems it would be ultimately cheaper(support, potential legal, churn, etc) and harbor more good will to just flag these old accounts and leave them alone. Most companies I've dealt with in the past just leave these older plans alone to rot, and try to motivate people off of them with new plans, new features, faster speeds, phone deals, etc. Not just arbitrarily deciding to jack up prices because "technically we're allowed to."

xur17 2y ago
I have one of these old grandfathered accounts from many years ago (< $20 / line for unlimited data, 5gb tethering, unlimited sms, and unlimited voice). What's weird is that they've actually upgraded the plan over time while keeping the price the same. It originally didn't include tethering, and was capped at 3gb of data.
- Dalewyn 2y ago
  I would hazard a guess that backend upgrades made keeping your plan as-original became impractical if not impossible, but hiking your price up and losing you as a customer was also wholly unappealing because any money is better than no money. So presumably AT&T did the next best thing for both you and themselves by silently(?) upgrading your plan to whatever was the new minimum of the new hardware while keeping true to the price lock to keep you as a customer.
- Akronymus 2y ago
  The unlimited data but limited tethering is one of the more scummy moves by telecoms IMO.
  - immibis 2y ago
    Is it? When you pay a certain amount at a buffet for unlimited food, they let you eat as much as you want at the buffet, but they don't let you bag it up and take it home. True unlimited costs a lot more. There are ugly ways to cheat the system by replacing your stomach with a food sack and not chewing.
    - Dylan16807 2y ago
      The buffet analogy isn't very compelling when ordinary people will watch video on their phones for long periods, easily using 3GB+ per hour. I don't want more data, I just want flexibility. (If we really want to force a buffet analogy, it's like living in a dorm with a permanent buffet, but you're not allowed to bring buffet food into the lounge or back to your room.)
    - happymellon 2y ago
      This makes no sense, it would be more akin to buying a meal and only being allowed to eat noodles with the left side of the mouth. You paid for X amount of data, why does it matter if you are using it for a work VPN or browsing HN?
      - immibis 2y ago
        Except you didn't? You paid for all-you-can-eat-on-a-phone, and 5 GB extra. So it's a dormitory with unlimited dining hall, but you can only take one plate a week outside of the dining hall. For the provider, the point of this design is that there's only a certain amount that people are willing to download on a phone or eat in a dining hall. For the consumer, they don't have to count their data or their servings as long as they follow a simple rule - they get predictable billing.
        Dylan16807 2y ago
        > So it's a dormitory with unlimited dining hall, but you can only take one plate a week outside of the dining hall. You see how that's bad, right? My phone service, a utility, should not be micromanaging me.
        doubleg72 2y ago
        They aren’t, they manage their spectrum you are agreeing to use.
        2y ago
  - happymellon 2y ago
    I'm not in the US, but I've not heard of this. My 60Gb can be consumed by YouTube, HN or tethering. It doesn't really matter to them. Is this common in other countries?
    - jonfw 2y ago
      It's less common for limited data like you have, it's more common for unlimited data. Essentially they don't want people using tethering as a replacement for home internet on these plans
      - happymellon 2y ago
        I could have got an unlimited plan, except that it costs more and even with tethering I don't go through more than 40GB so I saved a bit and downgraded to a limited plan. The data limitations was a personal choice. I don't see any of the providers here in the UK with different amounts for tethering Vs data.
  - JohnClark1337 2y ago
    One of the reasons I used to swap out the OS on my android phone. Back then I used CyanogenMod (now LineageOS) and they weren't able to track when I was using tethering and when I was just using my regular data.
renewiltord 2y ago
AT&T did it by just turning off their old network haha. Then you had to pay to migrate. A friend of mine did this. I just stick with Google Fi which I like for simplicity.
vsnf 2y ago
I had an ATT unlimited data plan, grandfathered from way back in 2004 or something. It was wonderful while cellular data was still only available in limited amounts. I only finally moved off it about 3 years ago. ATT never seemed to care much. The only problems I had were when I had to make certain changes to my account, the staff could never find my plan in the system -- on more than one occasion we had actual ATT database admins on the line to resolve things.
- dyauspitr 2y ago
  I had the exact same situation. I stuck with it through the limited data plan era with my grandfathered ATT plan and only changed it once we got the unlimited data plans again. It was great, the only problem I had was even though the data was unlimited, the grandfathered plan had a 400 text messages limit which wasn’t enough.
- consp 2y ago
  Had the same idea from 2004 to 2010 at T-Mobile in Europe before they were bought out by VC. They just canceled the plans and switched me over but due to their special "after 6 years you triple the data and call volume and it never expires" I had booked enough minutes (which were exchangable for data on the new plan) to have free internet for another two. Of course the new contracts all had expiring minutes as soon as they figured that out.
xp84 2y ago
Most people won’t go through the hassle of cancelling. They will bring in a LOT of money, and pay out a few of the pathetic “last bill” refunds. This whole thing though is like thinking you have wedding vows and not realizing there was fine print. It’s like “forsaking all others, till death do us part” but at the end of the vows it says “and if I break these vows I’ll pay you $75.”
- generic92034 2y ago
  > “and if I break these vows I’ll pay you $75.” Depending on the financial circumstances one party might receive much more than $75 while breaking the vows. ;)
deepsun 2y ago
While I was thinking it's a good thing, I just remembered of a tangential question -- home ownership. Do you think it's fair when someone bought a house long time ago, and hence pay just a small fraction of the property taxes of what newcomers pay, but get the same services (roads, schools, utilities etc) that are paid by property taxes?
- silisili 2y ago
  That's not how property taxes typically work in most places. An assessor updates the values on some period, taxes go up, and they pay their share. That actually became a huge issue in El Paso. Their property taxes range 2 - 3% of home value, which was fine when everything was worth 150k 5 years ago. Today it's nearly tripled, and some got tax bills in the 5 digits for homes they've had forever. Some states, like FL, prevent that from happening, which sounds nice on paper but is essentially what you describe. I'm not sure how I feel about that, but it was intended for retirees so I kinda get it. If your question is, is it fair people who bought before 2020 have an awesome interest rate and pay way less than newcomers, I'd say no, only because I'm angry I sold in 2019 and regret it!
  - throw__away7391 2y ago
    In most places geographically speaking no, but a number of US states including California and Florida which account for a disproportionate number of homes have passed laws protecting existing homeowners from property tax increases by capping the rate taxes can be raised to well below the rate of housing price inflation. So as a new buyer you're paying not only a higher price and higher interest rate, but also higher taxes than the people you bought it from.
    - silisili 2y ago
      I actually like how FL handles this. They don't stop it from increasing, they just slow the rate of increase. I'd say it's not fair for someone who budgeted appropriately to get forced out of their home for something out of their control, like the historic explosion of house prices. In time it'll work itself out, assuming they stay long enough, as it still allows increases in a falling or stagnant market.
rollcat 2y ago
I'm 100% convinced that all telecoms are bastards. Fortunately, regulation seems to help at least a little bit, but you kinda have to be prepared to wage some war - or eat your losses. (Just lost a phone number that has been my primary for over 7 years; that's after losing another one that I held on to for 11 years... Not to mention all the smaller stuff, like how contracts/extra packages are structured once you go over the month's limit.)
- Akronymus 2y ago
  > I'm 100% convinced that all telecoms are bastards. The one I use literally just increases how much data is included with my plan, rather than increasing the price. I quite like it. (I don't think it's available outside of austria though) https://www.hot.at/ https://www.hot.at/
- dreamcompiler 2y ago
  Competition is what helps even more. The Sprint/T-Mobile merger should never have been allowed to happen. Mergers are never good for consumers, despite Chicago School propaganda that says otherwise.
  - Avshalom 2y ago
    Preventing mergers is regulation.
  - darksim905 2y ago
    Chicago School?
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - tokai 2y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_of_economics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_of_economics
- 2y ago
adastra22 2y ago
I believe they are losing money on some of these contracts, which changes the calculus significantly. During 2020-2025 some people even got multiple $5/mo plans for added lines, which T-Mobile is now regretting. They've already tried once to force-change some people's contracts (but backed down).

xur17 2y ago

I have one of these old grandfathered accounts from many years ago (< $20 / line for unlimited data, 5gb tethering, unlimited sms, and unlimited voice). What's weird is that they've actually upgraded the plan over time while keeping the price the same. It originally didn't include tethering, and was capped at 3gb of data.

Dalewyn 2y ago
I would hazard a guess that backend upgrades made keeping your plan as-original became impractical if not impossible, but hiking your price up and losing you as a customer was also wholly unappealing because any money is better than no money. So presumably AT&T did the next best thing for both you and themselves by silently(?) upgrading your plan to whatever was the new minimum of the new hardware while keeping true to the price lock to keep you as a customer.
Akronymus 2y ago
The unlimited data but limited tethering is one of the more scummy moves by telecoms IMO.
- immibis 2y ago
  Is it? When you pay a certain amount at a buffet for unlimited food, they let you eat as much as you want at the buffet, but they don't let you bag it up and take it home. True unlimited costs a lot more. There are ugly ways to cheat the system by replacing your stomach with a food sack and not chewing.
  - Dylan16807 2y ago
    The buffet analogy isn't very compelling when ordinary people will watch video on their phones for long periods, easily using 3GB+ per hour. I don't want more data, I just want flexibility. (If we really want to force a buffet analogy, it's like living in a dorm with a permanent buffet, but you're not allowed to bring buffet food into the lounge or back to your room.)
  - happymellon 2y ago
    This makes no sense, it would be more akin to buying a meal and only being allowed to eat noodles with the left side of the mouth. You paid for X amount of data, why does it matter if you are using it for a work VPN or browsing HN?
    - immibis 2y ago
      Except you didn't? You paid for all-you-can-eat-on-a-phone, and 5 GB extra. So it's a dormitory with unlimited dining hall, but you can only take one plate a week outside of the dining hall. For the provider, the point of this design is that there's only a certain amount that people are willing to download on a phone or eat in a dining hall. For the consumer, they don't have to count their data or their servings as long as they follow a simple rule - they get predictable billing.
      - Dylan16807 2y ago
        > So it's a dormitory with unlimited dining hall, but you can only take one plate a week outside of the dining hall. You see how that's bad, right? My phone service, a utility, should not be micromanaging me.
        doubleg72 2y ago
        They aren’t, they manage their spectrum you are agreeing to use.
        2y ago
- happymellon 2y ago
  I'm not in the US, but I've not heard of this. My 60Gb can be consumed by YouTube, HN or tethering. It doesn't really matter to them. Is this common in other countries?
  - jonfw 2y ago
    It's less common for limited data like you have, it's more common for unlimited data. Essentially they don't want people using tethering as a replacement for home internet on these plans
    - happymellon 2y ago
      I could have got an unlimited plan, except that it costs more and even with tethering I don't go through more than 40GB so I saved a bit and downgraded to a limited plan. The data limitations was a personal choice. I don't see any of the providers here in the UK with different amounts for tethering Vs data.
- JohnClark1337 2y ago
  One of the reasons I used to swap out the OS on my android phone. Back then I used CyanogenMod (now LineageOS) and they weren't able to track when I was using tethering and when I was just using my regular data.

renewiltord 2y ago

AT&T did it by just turning off their old network haha. Then you had to pay to migrate. A friend of mine did this. I just stick with Google Fi which I like for simplicity.

vsnf 2y ago

I had an ATT unlimited data plan, grandfathered from way back in 2004 or something. It was wonderful while cellular data was still only available in limited amounts. I only finally moved off it about 3 years ago. ATT never seemed to care much. The only problems I had were when I had to make certain changes to my account, the staff could never find my plan in the system -- on more than one occasion we had actual ATT database admins on the line to resolve things.

dyauspitr 2y ago
I had the exact same situation. I stuck with it through the limited data plan era with my grandfathered ATT plan and only changed it once we got the unlimited data plans again. It was great, the only problem I had was even though the data was unlimited, the grandfathered plan had a 400 text messages limit which wasn’t enough.
consp 2y ago
Had the same idea from 2004 to 2010 at T-Mobile in Europe before they were bought out by VC. They just canceled the plans and switched me over but due to their special "after 6 years you triple the data and call volume and it never expires" I had booked enough minutes (which were exchangable for data on the new plan) to have free internet for another two. Of course the new contracts all had expiring minutes as soon as they figured that out.

xp84 2y ago

Most people won’t go through the hassle of cancelling. They will bring in a LOT of money, and pay out a few of the pathetic “last bill” refunds. This whole thing though is like thinking you have wedding vows and not realizing there was fine print. It’s like “forsaking all others, till death do us part” but at the end of the vows it says “and if I break these vows I’ll pay you $75.”

generic92034 2y ago
> “and if I break these vows I’ll pay you $75.” Depending on the financial circumstances one party might receive much more than $75 while breaking the vows. ;)

deepsun 2y ago

While I was thinking it's a good thing, I just remembered of a tangential question -- home ownership. Do you think it's fair when someone bought a house long time ago, and hence pay just a small fraction of the property taxes of what newcomers pay, but get the same services (roads, schools, utilities etc) that are paid by property taxes?

silisili 2y ago
That's not how property taxes typically work in most places. An assessor updates the values on some period, taxes go up, and they pay their share. That actually became a huge issue in El Paso. Their property taxes range 2 - 3% of home value, which was fine when everything was worth 150k 5 years ago. Today it's nearly tripled, and some got tax bills in the 5 digits for homes they've had forever. Some states, like FL, prevent that from happening, which sounds nice on paper but is essentially what you describe. I'm not sure how I feel about that, but it was intended for retirees so I kinda get it. If your question is, is it fair people who bought before 2020 have an awesome interest rate and pay way less than newcomers, I'd say no, only because I'm angry I sold in 2019 and regret it!
- throw__away7391 2y ago
  In most places geographically speaking no, but a number of US states including California and Florida which account for a disproportionate number of homes have passed laws protecting existing homeowners from property tax increases by capping the rate taxes can be raised to well below the rate of housing price inflation. So as a new buyer you're paying not only a higher price and higher interest rate, but also higher taxes than the people you bought it from.
  - silisili 2y ago
    I actually like how FL handles this. They don't stop it from increasing, they just slow the rate of increase. I'd say it's not fair for someone who budgeted appropriately to get forced out of their home for something out of their control, like the historic explosion of house prices. In time it'll work itself out, assuming they stay long enough, as it still allows increases in a falling or stagnant market.

rollcat 2y ago

I'm 100% convinced that all telecoms are bastards. Fortunately, regulation seems to help at least a little bit, but you kinda have to be prepared to wage some war - or eat your losses. (Just lost a phone number that has been my primary for over 7 years; that's after losing another one that I held on to for 11 years... Not to mention all the smaller stuff, like how contracts/extra packages are structured once you go over the month's limit.)

Akronymus 2y ago
> I'm 100% convinced that all telecoms are bastards. The one I use literally just increases how much data is included with my plan, rather than increasing the price. I quite like it. (I don't think it's available outside of austria though) https://www.hot.at/ https://www.hot.at/
dreamcompiler 2y ago
Competition is what helps even more. The Sprint/T-Mobile merger should never have been allowed to happen. Mergers are never good for consumers, despite Chicago School propaganda that says otherwise.
- Avshalom 2y ago
  Preventing mergers is regulation.
- darksim905 2y ago
  Chicago School?
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - tokai 2y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_of_economics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_of_economics
2y ago

adastra22 2y ago

I believe they are losing money on some of these contracts, which changes the calculus significantly. During 2020-2025 some people even got multiple $5/mo plans for added lines, which T-Mobile is now regretting. They've already tried once to force-change some people's contracts (but backed down).