“When FaceTime over Cellular launched in September 2012, we explained that we wanted to roll it out gradually to ensure the service had minimal impact on the mobile experience for all of our customers,” Mark Collins, Senior Vice President – Data and Voice Products, blogs for AT&T.
“As a result of ongoing testing, we’re announcing AT&T will enable FaceTime over Cellular at no extra charge for customers with any tiered data plan using a compatible iOS device,” Collins explains. “This means iPhone 4S customers with tiered plans will be able to make FaceTime calls over the AT&T cellular network. AT&T previously made FaceTime over Cellular available to customers with a Mobile Share plan and those with an LTE device on tiered plans.”
“We have already begun updating our systems and processes and expect to start rolling the update out to customers on an ongoing basis beginning in the next couple of weeks,” Collins writes. “Customers do not need to do anything—the update will be applied automatically over the next few months.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Dan K.” and “Lynn Weiler” for the heads up.]
Yo, Luigi! You can let that AT&T CEO’s daughter go now.
It sounds like the grandfathered-in unlimited data folks are still out of luck. At least for the time being.
That’s the point. AT&T is going to keep pushing until they get all of you to change over to one of the current tiered plans. When there are too few of you left to make too much of a stink, they are going to find a quasi-legal way to cut the rest of you off of the unlimited plan, too.
I am not saying that this is right. But I believe that it is going to happen. Soon after AT&T offered unlimited plans, they realized that they were passing up a revenue opportunity of massive proportions – tiered plans with large overage fees would incentivize people to overbuy their plan to avoid punitive charges. It worked for voice minutes in the past and, as soon as they fully realized that Apple had released an actual mobile computer in the iPhone that would enable people to consume lots of data, they saw the same opportunity with data. Witness the speed with which AT&T ended the unlimited data plan for the iPad. The pre-announcement period lasted far longer than the actual period of availability. AT&T offered the iPad unlimited plan just long enough to avoid legal repercussions for false advertising during the run-up to the release of the iPad.
I am not necessarily in love with unlimited plans. It is certainly nice to be able to use a device without always worrying about running into a data or minutes cap, but a small percentage of consumers abuse unlimited plans to the detriment of the rest – we essentially subsidize the data hogs. That said, I believe that the cell phone companies (and ISPs and cable/satellite companies, for that matter), are screwing consumers in the United States. We pay more for less than most of the rest of the world. And we will continue to do so as long as we are too lazy to do anything about it.
I think the issue I mostly have is that their tiered plan is based on ridiculously small data increments, and in today’s realistic data usage terms it is unacceptable.
And again, There is no such thing as a mystical unicorn data hogger. That is a a boogey man ATT conjured up to appeal to people’s emotions with zero factual backup. zero.
I’m not saying it should be thousands of gigs. But certainly in the hundreds of gigs for the prices they charge for 2 or 5GB. Maybe even in the tens of gigs would be more realistic. How are we lazy about it? What can we really do? I slam ATT on their facebook page, I’ve written the FCC about this very issue even. I know many others have- but where does it get us?
Agreed. If it is only for tiered data plans then it is NOT “at no extra charge” as the headline says.
My chat with AT&T -read below
Please wait for a site operator to respond.
You are now chatting with ‘Albert VanHeesch’
Albert VanHeesch: Hello Mr. Freeman thank you for chatting in with AT&T billing support! I can absolutely help you with your monthly subscriptions today.
John Freeman: i want to cancel them
John Freeman: but i am not receiving the text from AT&T
John Freeman: that allows me to continue
Albert VanHeesch: I would be more than happy to cancel them for you and if you wish, I can add our free Purchase Blocker, which will prompt for a pin number before each purchase such as these.
John Freeman: one other question… how is it that Virgin Mobile can offer 35 dollar a month unlimited data text and phone with no contract? and AT&T cannot?
John Freeman: okay please cancel them
John Freeman: i look at my monthly bill and see that I can save over a hundred dollars a month by switching
John Freeman: that’s 1200 dollars a year
John Freeman: more than enough to cover the up front cost of the iphones
Albert VanHeesch: I do understand your concerns and I apologize for any inconvenience. I am very sorry that our plans are not as financially suitable, however I can assure you that our service is better. I have canceled the mobile subscriptions for you and although they will still appear on this bill, they will show on your next bill as a credit.
John Freeman: thanks
John Freeman: what is superior about your service?
John Freeman: clear talk offers iphone 5 at walmart for $45 a month no contract
John Freeman: what can AT&T do to stop me from switching when my CONTRACT is up?
John Freeman: i’m paying 200 a month for three phones
Albert VanHeesch: I completely understand your concerns and I hope that you would choose to stay with AT&T. We do offer equipment discounts at the time of upgrade, however we do not discount plans or features.
John Freeman: i can pay 105 a month for 3 phones with Virgin
John Freeman: can you do me a favor?
Albert VanHeesch: Certainly.
John Freeman: can you send this chat to someone higher up who can make a diference. AT&T is going to lose me and I have been with them for years… I gave AT&T a lot of money over the last few years
John Freeman: and I have never seen a drop in my phone bill costs
Albert VanHeesch: I apologize that your bills have stayed the same, however we do not discount plans and features and I am very sorry for the inconvenience. If you’d like, I can provide the number to our Retention center and they may be able to provide an offer for you due to your tenure with us.
John Freeman: send it cause… i’m about to jump ship
I’m surprised AT&T lets you talk on their voice plan. These people are still troglodytes living underground.
Your still screwed if you have an unlimited plan
Yeah…anything to get us to drop the unlimited but slower after the cap plan.
Ohhhhh I wonder if this has anything to do with it…
Facebook launches free calling for all iPhone users in the US
http://www.theverge.com/2013/1/16/3883538/facebook-launches-free-calling-in-messenger-for-iphone-us
I thought they did this last year – I have unlimited and my facetime over cellular was turned on in November see: http://www.cultofmac.com/202358/facetime-over-cellular-now-a-go-for-many-att-unlimited-data-customers/
@ Whatever
Unfortunately, such success cases don’t appear to be universal, suggesting that either AT&T is rolling out the feature gradually, or else that it may have been turned on for some customers. (Taken from the same headline)
When I turn on cellular, I get a message to call AT&T
Just 3 days ago I wanted to do FT on my iPhone 5 with grandfathered unlimited plan. In settings, when i went to turn on the “Facetime over cellulsr” festure, I had to call AT&T because a message told me to call them to enSbke it.
Long story short — and after being in the phone for 20 minutes with N AT&T womAn flipping pages in a customer service manual — she finally said No, I could not have that with my unlimited plan, only tired plans, and would I like to cancel unlimited and change to a tiered plan of 2Gb/month!
?, she asked.
Heck no. Goodbye!
What is the average data usage per minute for a Facetime call. I know this will vary by the bandwidth available but it would be interesting to know how many minutes it would take up to use 2GB of data.
Thanks AT&T, thanks for rewarding your loyal early adopters by locking them out because they have the unlimited plan. Way to build customer loyalty.
+1~
this is one of the reasons i left AT&T!!! they want to charge you to make anything…. A$$HOLES