AT&T hikes fee to break iPhone contract

Posted May 21, 2010 at 2:00 p.m.

Associated Press | AT&T is raising the fee it charges buyers
of the iPhone and other smart phones if they break their two-year
contracts. Starting June 1, those buyers will have to pay $325 for
breaking their contract, up from $175 currently. For buyers of regular
phones, the fee is being decreased by $25 to $150.


The early termination fee goes down for every month customers stay in their contract — by $10 for smart phones and $4 for regular phones. So if a smart phone contract is broken after two months, the termination fee is reduced by $20 to $305.

The changes only apply to new contracts.

Verizon Wireless raised its smart phone termination fees in November. Federal regulators have been looking into the practice of charging higher fees for smart phones.

 

4 comments:

  1. JR in Illinois May 21, 2010 at 4:49 pm

    So they are going to charge $90 fto someone who terminates their contract 1 month before it expires? That seems unfair, and it seems like they are asking for the government to step in a regulate these fees.

  2. Jim May 21, 2010 at 5:46 pm

    At&T has the worst service. The company I work for has them, they used to have Verizon and they were pretty good. I have T-Mobile for my personal carrier and I never have had any problems, but AT&T sucks!

  3. Roadlife May 21, 2010 at 8:39 pm

    Congress should look into the actions of all the telcos.
    If each of them delivered the service they promise, they wouldn’t have to worry about terminated contracts.
    As long as the customer is satisfied, they are happy and continue the service. Myself, I’m so burned up at the way Verizon treats old customers I’d quit them but, regrettably, I have no other choice.

  4. southern May 21, 2010 at 8:55 pm

    They should just eliminate the process of giving away discocunted phones and then they could get away with the early discount fees and also charge less per month for their service. These fees cover the cost of the phones and most people dont realize they are just really paying for the phone in the cost of the plan. It costs more for the smart phones and they have to subsidize the vendors for these phones to get them at a price to sell them. SO if you want to pay face value for the phone, you would not have to worry about this.