AT&T Wireless customers

[G G]

Does anyone have the new mobile share plan? I switched to it a few months ago and got the 10 gig plan with two smartphones which with my 17% discount was about $180 and some change per month. Realized after the first month I didn't need 10 because the wife doesn't work and doesn't go anywhere too much so the reality is I pretty much get all the data. I switched down to the 6 gig plan for $160 and some change. Got online today and saw that they now have what they are calling value mobile share plans that start at the 10 gigs a month. If I switch to the 10 gig plan my price now does down to $113 and some change before taxes and fees so I will prolly be paying around $130 for more data than I had before. The way it works is I pay $100 for the data plan and then $15 per phone, which I get the 17% off the $100. They told me when I called to verify this that if I upgrade then I have to go back to paying $40 per phone which I am already doing now with the 6 gig plan. So I asked if I do upgrade I can switch back to the 6 gig plan for the same money I'm paying now and they said yes. I guess as long as the 6 gig plan doesn't go up I would be good. I don't really plan to upgrade anytime soon anyway. Anyone have the mobile share plan with 6 gig or less per month? It might behoove you to take a look at it. I think this may be due to T-Mobile putting a spanking on AT&T as of late and they are trying to stop bleeding customers from what I understand on Howard Forums.

[CigarNut]

Thanks for the info Greg! We have a family plan -- shared minutes and individual data plans. Sounds like this might be a better way to go for us.

[G G]

I actually had the unlimited data grandfathered and switched a couple months ago because I needed the mobile hotspot feature for a wifi only Ipad I needed to use selling insurance and I haven't been sorry yet. It's unlimited talk and text plus whatever data bucket you pick.

[G G]

I did learn today that if you switch to this plan then you do lose the ability to go back to your old plan and you lose the ability to upgrade with a subsidy too from what I gather. You would have to buy your own device, pay retail for it from AT&T or use the NEXT program for upgrades. But I also looked at the local craigslist and say tons of Iphone 5s for anywhere from $225 up to $600. I don't intend to upgrade anytime soon anyway and will just buy one when I do because I am saving roughly $350 a year with this plan.

[G G]

And that info is is not what i was told by customer service but i find that you hardly ever find a cs agent that tells you good info.

[G G]

I did learn today that if you switch to this plan then you do lose the ability to go back to your old plan and you lose the ability to upgrade with a subsidy too from what I gather. You would have to buy your own device, pay retail for it from AT&T or use the NEXT program for upgrades. But I also looked at the local craigslist and say tons of Iphone 5s for anywhere from $225 up to $600. I don't intend to upgrade anytime soon anyway and will just buy one when I do because I am saving roughly $350 a year with this plan.
I went back and did some more reading and realize that I misread. You can go back to your old plan if it was already a mobile share if you want to do a subsidized upgrade, you will have to sign a two year agreement (as always) and you will then pay $40 for the upgraded phone instead of $15.

[dave]

I'll try to look into it. Sorry to admit, Greg, but I tried reading through this thread 3 times and I still don't follow. I'm paying 200 and change....I've got three phones:

-family talk 700 min
-unlimited txt
-individual data plan:

a - 3 GB
b - 3 GB
c - unlimited

Haven't wanted to mess with it too much because of the grandfathered unlimited on my son's phone. But, I'm always looking to save, so I'll try to figure it out.

[G G]

It's a lot to read through and I don't always explain things as well as if I could talk to you. If you were to switch to a 10 gig shared data plan called mobile share value the it would be $100.00 for the data + $15 per phone for a total of $145 before taxes and fees. You can get 15 gigs for $130 plus $15 per phone for a total of $175. Bumping up to 20 gigs would cost $150 plus $15 per phone for a total of $195.

And the mobile share value or regular mobile share plans come with unlimited talk and text.

Here's a link to the page explaining the cost:

http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/data-plans.html

[dave]

Appreciate it, Greg! I'll have to do some research - mostly on my son's usage. I've been very protective of the unlimited portion of our plan. I think that it will only become more valuable in the future. The wife and I can probably get by on 5GB -- but, the boy's away at school and has never had to worry about limits or finding wifi....we'll see.

[G G]

I gave up my grandfathered unlimited a couple months ago to switch to the Mobile share plan because I needed the mobile hotspot to be available so I could connect my wifi only Ipad to my cellular data, I haven't really missed it and I stream ITunes Radio to my truck stereo and whatever else I need. It's not been a problem for me, but it could very well be another story with your son.

[SvilleKid]

Still use grandfathered unlimited plan. With two children on it that are tech savvy, would cost a fortune to change.

[CigarNut]

Don't get too attached to that Grandfathered plan -- AT&T can (and does) throttle people back (lower their bandwidth) when they use "too much". This was challenged in court and AT&T won.

I have the grandfathered plan and this has not happened to me, but I don't use it as fully as I could. I am looking at changing over to the "new" plans as I like AT&T, just hate the cost.

[G G]

From my understanding they throttle you at 3 gigs usage on 3G and 5 gigs usage on LTE.

[SvilleKid]

Don't get too attached to that Grandfathered plan -- AT&T can (and does) throttle people back (lower their bandwidth) when they use "too much". This was challenged in court and AT&T won.

I have the grandfathered plan and this has not happened to me, but I don't use it as fully as I could. I am looking at changing over to the "new" plans as I like AT&T, just hate the cost.

A high percent of the use is thru wifi, so probably never get close to the "throttle back" point. Never had it happen, so will hang with it unless it becomes an issue.