Following in Verizon’s footsteps, AT&T is raising its activation and upgrade fees

By Lulu Chang January 19, 2017

att 5g evolution at t feat — Image used with permission by copyright holder

If you don’t like what AT&T just did to its upgrade and activation fees, perhaps you can blame Verizon. Proving just how much the major phone carriers are in lockstep with one another — especially when it means getting us to pay more — AT&T has followed in the footsteps of Big Red, and is upping the ante on how much it charges if you want to upgrade or activate a device. Beginning Friday, you’re looking at a $25 charge, up from $20. A spokesman for AT&T has confirmed the change, saying simply that the carrier is “making a minor adjustment.”

Just a few weeks ago, Verizon made a similar decision, though it raised its fees by a larger margin, from $20 to $30. Verizon has recently been making quite a few announcements that have left customers less than thrilled, including effectively cutting off unlimited subscribers.

Both AT&T and Verizon may want to be careful about just how upset they’re making their customers. After all, T-Mobile and Sprint are both gaining on the two pack leaders, claiming increased market share. Verizon, on the other hand, lost 36,000 postpaid net phone subscribers in the third quarter of 2016, while AT&T lost 268,000 postpaid phone customers during the same period. That makes it the eighth consecutive quarter in which AT&T has delivered bad news in that regard.

It doesn’t look as though AT&T is interested in competing against other carriers for just any customers. Rather, as Fierce Wireless reports, the Dallas-headquartered company is more focused on keeping its “high-end users,” and “monetizing them as effectively as possible.” While it’s unclear precisely how it’s doing that, it seems to be working — despite the loss in postpaid phone customers in the third quarter of 2016, it posted revenues of $40 billion, representing a 4.6 percent increase.

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Verizon and AT&T propose 5G midband power limits to avoid aircraft interference

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Following concerns from the aviation industry, both Verizon and AT&T have agreed to temporarily lower the power of their new midband 5G towers to quell fears that the new spectrum could interfere with equipment on board commercial and military aircraft.
When the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced plans last year to auction a new section of C-band spectrum, a number of commercial aviation groups raised concerns that these new 5G frequencies could cause catastrophic failures in avionics that could even lead to collisions. As a result, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and U.S. Department of Transportation jointly called on the FCC to pause the auction until the matter could be more thoroughly investigated.

Despite this, the FCC forged ahead, disagreeing with studies that suggested that a concentration of 5G telecommunications in the new 3.7–3.98GHz C-band could bleed through into the 4.2–4.4GHz range used by aircraft equipment such as radar altimeters. The 0.2GHz buffer in-between the frequencies was more than sufficient to avoid interference, FCC officials said.
Earlier this month, however, The Wall Street Journal reported that Verizon and AT&T agreed to delay their midband 5G rollouts into early 2022 at the request of FAA officials. Both carriers had planned to begin rolling out the new spectrum in early December, but voluntarily pushed the date back to January 5 in “the spirit of good faith,” as Verizon officials said. While the FCC and carriers still insist that the C-band rollout poses no risk to cockpit safety systems, they’ve agreed to work with the FAA to try to address its concerns, and now they’re proposing another compromise to further placate the aviation industry.
According to the WSJ, Verizon and AT&T have sent a joint letter to FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, offering to dial back the power of their 5G cell towers for six months to give aviation safety researchers time to more carefully study the effects of the new spectrum on equipment such as radar altimeters.
While an overall limit on midband 5G power would be applied nationwide, the companies also promised to lower the signal output even further near airports and helipads. In the letter to Rosenworcel, the companies added that they “remain confident that 5G poses no risk to air safety,” but they also want to be “sensitive to the Federal Aviation Administration’s desire for additional analysis of this issue.”
An FCC spokesperson said that the agency has agreed with the limits, describing it as “one of the most comprehensive efforts in the world to safeguard aviation technologies,” and says it will work with the FAA to get the new 5G frequencies deployed “both safely and swiftly.”
Both AT&T and Verizon remain on track to begin their new midband 5G deployments on January 5, 2022, and executives note that they don’t expect the temporary limits to have any serious effects on bandwidth during the initial rollouts.

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Currently, AT&T has its “Next Up” add-on, which has been available for the past several years. This program costs $6 extra per month and lets you upgrade by trading in your existing phone after at least half of it is paid off. But the new Next Up Anytime option gives you some more flexibility.