‘Heavy’ data users on the iPhone may face special usage fees in the future

Posted by Dennis Sellers Dec 9, 2009 at 1:25pm

Watching a lot of video on your iPhone? You can expect special usage fees in the future, Ralph de la Vega, CEO of AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets,, said today at a UBS conference in New York.

The carrier has had trouble keeping up with wireless data usage, leading to dropped connections and long waits for users trying to run programs on their devices. AT&T is upgrading its network to cope, but its head of consumer services, Ralph de la Vega, told investors at a UBS conference in New York that it will also give high-bandwidth users incentives to “reduce or modify their usage,” according to the Associated Press.

De la Vega didn’t say how or when the carrier would change its policies, but he said some form of usage-based pricing for data is inevitable, the article adds. Right now, the carrier doesn’t limit data usage for smart phones. It also doesn’t make it easy for subscribers to know how much data they’re consuming, notes the AP.

“We need to educate the customer … We’ve got to get them to understand what represents a megabyte of data,” de la Vega said. “We’re improving all our systems to let consumers get real-time information on their data usage. Longer term, there’s got to be some sort of pricing scheme that addresses the [heavy] users”

He added that 3% of smartphone users are consuming 40% of the network activity. Focus groups have been formed at AT&T to figure out how to deal with the problem, De la Vega said. AT&T is already setting up its systems to give smartphone users real-time data on their data patterns, he added.

Advanced Search

Article Information

Comment on this Article Print this Article Email this Article Digg This

Contributor

Recent Articles