AT&T Waives Data Cap Amid COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 seems to be the most covered news item of the week, as it continues its rampant spread all over the world. With the aggressive transmission tendencies of the viral pandemic, forcing major countries to shut down their borders and operations, the world is witnessing a different kind of social shutdown. As most schools and colleges across North America and Europe stay shut, data providers have decided to do their part to help people get used to the situation they are in. This has inspired, AT&T, one of the major ISPs in North America to suspend its existing data usage caps. Here’s a look at everything you need to know regarding the situation, and why this news will delight consumer groups across America.

Bunkered Down Due to COVID-19

Millions of Americans have put themselves in self-quarantine and are refusing to step outside in a bid to avoid catching the dangerous COVID-19, which is spreading across the globe. This move by AT&T is a welcome scheme for consumer groups as they will now have the liberty to enjoy broadband services as they like. This move has also led Senators to call out other ISPs and ask them to follow suit. As per a report by Motherboard, broadband caps do not have a true technical purpose, but rather serve as a form of the market price hike. Hence, in the wake of the COVID-19, AT&T has decided to do away with their broadband usage caps. However, the company has not mentioned to what date this waiver will stay valid, and so users will have to watch the news closely in order to stay updated.

Waiving Broadband Usage Caps

The company’s spokesperson said that most American users rely on AT&T’s unlimited internet connection, and that to make things easier for the rest of their customers, they have decided to waive the caps. Their official website states that the caps used to stand anywhere between 150 GB to 1 TB of data per month. Also, the penalty for bypassing the limit stood at $10 for each extra 50 GB consumed. Since the COVID-19 has forced a majority of Americans to work from home, learn from home, and in a general stay at home, this will come as a huge blessing. With most Americans having to rely on online classes for their education and video conferencing for their work-related, the cap would have placed a severe financial burden on them. In the wake of an already shaken economy, such a burden would have been a nightmare for most users, and hence, this news comes as a sigh of relief for most internet users in the US.

Need for Caps

Several industry experts and executives, including leaked Comcast data show that such broadband usage caps do little to help manage ISP congestions. Therefore, in essence, they serve as a way for ISPs to gather more revenue from their user base, by hiking the prices of their services. Rather than serving as a technical method to overcome congestion, broadband caps exist to help ISPs to boost their service cost above advertised rates.

Such reports, when published in Motherboard, have prompted 18 American Senators, including Mark Warner, the sitting Senator of Virginia to issue a letter prompting other ISPs to waive off their caps as well. The letter states that almost every industry in the US is figuring out how to battle the dangers posed by COVID-19, and that during such a time, every company must try to accommodate the efforts of the masses. It then requests the ISPs to temporarily waive off their usual broadband caps and penalties to help people enjoy free broadband options during such hard times. Similarly, consumer groups such as Free Press also issued statements asking ISPs to suspend their broadband usage caps owing to the pandemic.

AT&T has however remained silent when asked about what they plan to do regarding caps on cellular data. The biggest internet provider for homes in the US, Comcast also refused to comment on the issue. This means that Comcast’s standing cap will be enforced, and hence, users will be charged extra if they exceed their existing plan’s cap.

However, they did release a statement saying that they were going to improve their upload speed from 15Mbps /2Mbps to 25Mbps/3Mbps. Furthermore, Comcast also plans on giving its new low-income group customers 60 days of free Internet service. Also, Mediacom is offering its customers an additional 50GB worth of data up till March 31. With so many Americans being forced to work from home, as a result of the mass shutting of schools, colleges, and offices, it comes as no surprise that the largest ISPs in the US are beginning to react to the situation.