AT&T follows Verizon, jacks up ETF on netbooks and smartphones
By Darren Murph 
posted May 21st 2010 3:39PM
posted May 21st 2010 3:39PM
Update: AT&T has published an "open letter" explaining the changes. Thanks, Daniel!
[Thanks, L.]
Beginning June 1, 2010, AT&T is making changes that will lower the early termination fee (ETF) for many customers who agree to new term commitments, and will increase it for others.
• Customers who are buying basic and quick messaging phones will have a lower ETF of $150, reduced by $4 for each month during the balance of the service agreement.
• Customers who purchase a more advanced, higher-end device, including Netbooks and Smartphones, will have an ETF of $325, reduced by $10 for each month during the balance of the service agreement.
Current AT&T wireless customers who are within their existing service agreement or have an existing enterprise service agreement will see no change to their current terms.
Action Required
• Review the Know the Facts and FAQs to learn the complete details of the ETF change.
• Managers in Company Owned Retail should review the ETF Ops Brief for additional items required to support the change.
For all of you who keep complaining and obviously don't understand the cell industry here's a quick example for you. A 16GB 3GS costs the ATT store about $570. If you sign an agreement and cancel after the first month you're charged and ETF of $175 so there's another $200 of unrecovered hardware costs plus startup costs. That $36 activation fee everyone bitches about covers less than half of the actual startup costs on an account. Upping the ETF is only trying to lose less money when assholes cancel after 30 days so they can get a cheaper iPhone to unlock and take overseas or to tmobile
If companies use ETF's then they should be added to the base price of the phone in advertising!!!
I repeat if a company is allowed to use ETF's (which are evil) then they should not be allowed to advertise FREE PHONE or $199 and then hide the $350 ETF fee. The ETF fee should be detailed in all advertising and use the same font size as the price your paying for the phone.
They would stop using ETF's if they had to detail the figure in all advertising.
BAN ETF"S because they allow the networks to hide FEE'S for the phone or device. Also the $%age of ETF reduction "MUST" be "PRO-RATED" to the length of the contract and anything else should be illegal.
Good move by AT&T...
VERIZON iPHONE OR HTC EVO RELEASE??!! PERHAPS?! Either way AT&T IS SMART! WONDER HOW MANY DEFECTORS THEY'LL HAVE NOW...?
@Ardroid
And how does that work? The raised ETF's are for new contracts, therefore existing customers wouldn't be affected by it and therefore it wouldn't reduce the amount of people leaving.
Do you have any other great insight?
well that seals the deal for me as well bye ATT I mite miss you iphone...
I'm ready to dump my iPhone and go with somebody like Boost Mobile because my iPhone 3G is a crappy, unreliable phone - it's awesome in my house, but when I travel, ish. I do love my iPod Touch though.
I'm an At&t customer(Chicago) and I'm happy with them but this was a stupid move. They should've just kept it at 175 and let people switch, that way their service will not be bogged down by iPhone users.
Good thing this doesn't apply to current customers. I've pre-ordered my Evo at Best Buy and am leaving AT&T to Sprint on June 4th. I'm fine with paying the $175.
@Steven
If you put your evo on the 79$ plan, youll make up that ETF fee in about 6 months. ...not a bad move.
Hurray for AT&T and Welcome to the club! What took so long?!? There's hope for Sprint yet!
@Fornication Under Concent of the King
I almost forgot...
Ha Ha!
AT&T doesn't factor in device recovery costs into their monthly fees. That's what the ETF is for. Your monthly bill is for services rendered during that month, period. Whoever commented below about tmobile being the only carrier with reasonable fees ought to realize they HAVE to be extra reasonable, since they're in last place.
Not a problem for me. I'll upgrade my phone before May is over and exchange to the new iphone in June (30 day return policy). Thus, the new ETF won't apply to me because I upgraded before the new ETF went into affect. Logical, right?
@derekdevine
What if AT&T says "sure, we'll take your phone back BUT the iphone has a mandatory $325 ETF." What then? Remember, "you can bet you'll be nailed with the new terms once you head in this summer to pre-order that iPhone 4G."
@Fornication Under Concent of the I'll tell them I signed a 2-year agreement before the new one went into affect. It clearly states any subscriber who signs a new 2-year agreement or 2-year upgrade agreement starting June 1st. And if that fails, it was worth the try. But the point is I have nothing to lose.
@derekdevine
They'll just say that the contract you signed up for is for the 3g/s and when you return it before thirty days your contract is nullified there requiring you to get a new contract to get the 4th gen iPhone. But this just my two cents concerning your suggestion and like you said there us nothing to lose in trying so go for it.
Where is this image from?
TV commercial.
@Information Central Would you happen to have a link?
This is funny: "At AT&T, we work hard every day to provide you with a great wireless experience at competitive prices." That twit is wasting his time at AT&T he should be a comedy writer.
Guess what AT&T? Screw you and EFT. I don't need your stupid smart phones that bad. Now that is even funnier.
@gq330
What's EFT? If you want to be mad, at least get the term right. Besides, this is the way all US wireless carriers work, locking you and forcing you to pay for locked phones.
Time to learn how to spoof your IMEI #
GIMME MORE REASONS TO JUMP SHIP TO SPRINT WHY DONT YOU!!!......HTC Evo 4G looks mighty delicious right about now!
AT&T is just giving more and more reasons to get the evo 4g instead of the iPhone 4g
@Console fanboy
Really? Ever tried breaking off a contract with Sprint?
I work at a telecommunications company in Alaska (GCI) and wireless (cell phones) are one of our products, and the way our contracts work is $20 for each remaining month. Ya thats $480 at first but it goes down fast. To me that makes sense, the point of a contract is to keep the customer there and make money off them. The longer you there the more thats fulfilled.
I don't understand why people are up in arms about ETF. Even at $325, for devices like the iPhone, it's still not a bad deal. People were arguing that they don't want unlocked phones because they want their phones to be subsidized, yet they are up in arms about ETF. Get real! When I argued that all phones should be unlocked so people can switch carriers easily, a lot of you countered me that most people would not want that, and rather get a subsidized phone since most people don't switch phones that often. If that's the case, than this change in ETF won't matter as most people would follow through their 2 year contract.
If you don't like it, then simply buy the phone without contract. Eg. the AT&T Palm Pre is only $399 without contract.
AT&T appears to be preparing for the mass exodus of customers once the iPhone goes to Verizon.
I hate that damned ad. It reminds me of the movie Mr. Burns made for the Springfield Film Festival, where he injected himself into heroic and martyr roles from a variety of classic films. It's sentimental, emotionally manipulative, and self-serving twaddle.