AT&T is sending me a phone unsoliticited, activating it, and disabling my current phone?

In My Humble Opinion
41

Ok. Just called AT&T from my non-AT&T number. (I couldn’t even go on the website MYATT.com, because they have to TEXT you a security code-- and the phone with the AT&T number cannot receive texts! AARGH!)

The CSR I got said there was a note that I had talked to another CSR back in July and yeah, she blocked the new phone, “So I don’t know why it went out??”

She said when it gets here, it will come with a prepaid return label (like when you order clothes online) and I can just send it back.

I did tell her I was ditching AT&T when the dust settles, and to pass that on. She was very nice. Holy freaking crap.

42

Seems like most people in this thread know what’s going on but to clarify a few misstatements I’d seen:

AT&T is not switching to a new network - AT&T like all U.S. carriers operates legacy 3G networks and various bands of 4G networks. The 4G LTE network AT&T operates goes back probably 10 years or more, so there is not a “new” network being switched on, rather they will no longer be utilizing the spectrum used by the 3G network. This is not an AT&T thing for what it is worth, all the major U.S. carriers are sunsetting their 3G networks and repurposing them. Verizon and Sprint/T-Mobile also plan to complete this process in 2022, same as AT&T.

If you phone has a 4G LTE modem it likely will still be able to connect - the app that was posted is a great way for lay people to check, but you can also look at the specs of your phone to see what sort of cellular modems it has. The mentioned Galaxy J series is old enough that it’s in a “trouble” spot, some models of the J series actually shipped with only 2G/3G modems and no 4G LTE.

You may still be screwed when 3G goes away - Depending on where you most normally use your phone, even if your phone says it will work on AT&T’s 4G network (or any carrier’s), and even if you’ve run the app saying it works, you may still be screwed when 3G goes away. Why? A couple reasons. Some networks have gaps in their 4G LTE coverage such that you might regularly use your phone in an area where your connectivity is mostly on 3G, occasionally connecting some to the 4G network. I have some rural property I spend time at where my cellular connection is primarily 3G, when this switchover occurs I most likely will not be able to use my cell phone there without a mini-tower or something of that nature. For something like 95% of the country where people live, this won’t happen, but in some rural spots it absolutely will. The 3G network still covers more geographic areas than the 4G/LTE network.

There is no indication AT&T is planning to block phones via IMEI as part of this change - AT&T’s current business practice is to allow you to “Bring Your Own Device.” There are two-fold reasons for this. One, is back under the Obama administration there was a lot of talk of actually mandating carriers allow you to BYOD, at the time all the major carriers did allow it, but some of the niche discount carriers had weird setups where they were basically fully integrated with specific models of phone, and you couldn’t BYOD at all. No regulation was ever promulgated mandating it, but partially to head off regulatory oversight the majors have all allowed you to BYOD for like 8+ years. The other reason is AT&T actually advertises and attempts to sell plans to people who BYOD, and advertise advantages of taking them up on those plans. AT&T still makes money on people who have plans with them even if they BYOD, and they don’t want to miss out on that particular market. Any carrier could block a phone by IMEI, but there is not presently any indication that any carrier is planning to start blocking phones “they don’t like”, and there is no indication carriers are planning to do so as part of the 3G shutdown. There are some phones that have weird compatibility issues with SIM cards and stuff, but I think that’s very niche and happens when you’ve done something like imported some weird phone from the Chinese market to America or etc.

Since people have weighed in on it with opinion–I’ll note that all the carriers have customer-unfriendly business practices. There’s only three real carriers and some MVNOs. However not everything is malicious. A huge % of wireless customers are not tech savvy and do not understand what a 3G shutdown means. They will just experience one day having a cell phone, and the next day it no longer works. It may also be the only phone they have. AT&T with its automating distribution of new phones is likely assuming it will help far more people than it annoys, and I think that’s actually probably a fair bet. I assume the false positives like in this thread are probably niche phones (like the BlackBerry phones are) that just aren’t on some list that they’re working from, and most people whose phones are flagged as not working probably actually do have phones that will not work after the cutover. Arguably AT&T is going above and beyond what some of the other carriers are doing by trying to insure these people (many of whom may not even understand what is going on) don’t experience losing their phone service one day without knowing why, and having no option perhaps other than driving to an AT&T store to fix it (which raises its own concerns during a pandemic.)

43

I just went through the 3g issue with consumer cellular. They lease bandwidth from AT&T.

They sent my mom a free 4g flip phone to replace her 3g. She didn’t like the new phone. Seemed very cheap and flimsy. So we got her a Samsung Android 4G phone from CC.

I had to buy a new phone too. My Sony claimed to be 4G capable. It actually wasn’t fully 4g certified. So there went $500 for a new 5G.

44

Yeah, people like my Mom are who I was specifically thinking about in regards to probably benefitting from the mail-a-phone system. She actually has a relatively modern iPhone that I’ve got her on, but she wouldn’t understand the 3G shutdown or any of its implications. If anything getting a new phone in the mail with a notice her old phone was going to stop working, would at the very least be a guaranteed way for her to understand “oh hey I need to do something here.” She got rid of her landline years ago (a lot of people assume that elderly people still maintain landlines in large number, but at least in my personal familial experience even most of the elderly population has gradually moved away from a home landline.)

45

Fantastic post, bravo!

Only one note I might add here. 4G, like 3G before it and 5G currently, operates on a number of possible bands. Not all of the possible 4G bands are in use in each country and region, due to regulation, availability of key frequencies, what have you.

It is possible that a given older 4G phone does not support every 4G band, and most critically, it’s possible with a low likelihood that an older 4G phone does not support the 4G bands in use in your area. So a user could look up their phone, see that it is 4G compatible, only to find that it can’t make use of the 4G service in the user’s home area.

This was a common problem in the 3G and earlier eras because all-band chipsets were expensive and or not yet in existence. Manufacturers would put in a chipset that only worked on the common bands for the area the phone was marketed to. I don’t think that by 4G times that was still an issue, but it’s at least theoretically possible.

46

Even if your phone does everything right, the manufacturer may have decided that components without FCC approval will shutdown rather than connect to American networks. It solves all their licensing, approval, and market segmentation problems without requiring special hardware.

49

Since this got raised (probably by a spammer), I thought I’d note that it’s past the date AT&T said they would be sunsetting 3G. I’m curious if it has happened now, and how the OP is getting along.

50

Howdy! :wave:t4:

I kept my beloved BlackBerry Key2, ditched AT&T a few months ago, and went with T-Mobile. Even saved about $15/month 'cause T-Mobile has an old people’s cell phone rate of $50, unlimited everything. I guess they figure we don’t have many friends, don’t use the phone for text or email, and will be dead soon anyway.

I don’t remember exactly what the chronology of this was… but when I signed up with AT&T internet, I think I already had AT&T cell phone service (or maybe it was the other way around). In any case, at the AT&T store, I said to the sales rep, “I guess I should bundle them together, right?” And she said, “I wouldn’t.” So I didn’t. That made the divorce very simple. I still have AT&T internet (but no cable, just Roku).

51

Northern California here, within two hours drive of S. F. Bay Area. I have an AT&T 3G pre-paid mobile phone (what they used to call a “Go-Phone”) that I’ve had for about 10 years now. They have announced a drop-dead date of February 22. But mine still works.

I read somewhere (perhaps right on this Board) that it’s not just one switch in some central office that they will pull and their 3G shuts down nationwide. It happens separately region by region, and not all at once. I think this means that they are putting their efforts on upgrading the larger populated areas first, and will get on to upgrading us little farm towns later on.

ETA: From the OP:

I haven’t seen or heard anything at all about them sending me a new free cell phone! Where do I apply?

52

I don’t think people with the pre-paid go-phones got that deal. That’s what I had, too. And I had it for about 10 years. I used it as an emergency phone I carried in my pocket all the time. Costs me $12 a month. As the Feb. 22 deadline approached, I looked on the website for another phone. They had a cheap flip-phone but would not let me purchase it online. It said I had to purchase it in a store. I checked my local AT&T store and they did not have the phone. I’m sure the point of that was to make me consider a more expensive phone. My point was to have a cheap small phone so I had no interest in their other offerings.

I deleted my auto-pay information. They sent me a few texts when it was renewal time and that was after the deadline so I guess it would still be working now if I had paid. It wasn’t a big deal to drop it since it wasn’t my real phone. But I don’t particularly like having to carry my heavier cell phone around all the time.

53

@aurora_maire , sounds like your usage is similar to mine. I have this un-smart mobile phone almost solely to be my emergency phone while I’m on the road. I take it with me whenever I leave home. I hardly ever use it.

My deal was some-number-of-minutes for 90 days, renewable for $25 every 90 days, so I was paying about the same as you. If I renew before it expires, any left-over time carries forward. Since I hardly ever use it, I’ve accumulated lots of time over the last ten years. The account is shown in accumulated dollars rather than minutes. I have about $600+ dollars in this account by now.

A catch came up: When I tried to re-up a few years ago, I got a message that accumulating more than $600-some dollars was not allowed. So I called their customer support number for advice.

The CSR spoke with a moderate accent, but entirely intelligible, and she seemed totally knowledgeable and helpful. She set me up with a full-year renewal for $25.

The following year and the year after that, they gave me full-year renewals at no charge !! But that doesn’t mean I’m spending down my accumulated $600+ much, since I still hardly ever use this phone.

It has been on my do-queue for several months to look into getting a phone upgrade. I am hoping this can all be done on the same account so I get to keep the money in the account. I hope I can also keep the same phone number.

Your post has some details that look like they may be useful to me. I am thinking of getting another not-smart phone to replace this one. I don’t need a smarter-than-me phone. Maybe one can buy one by calling their knowledgeable CSR who speaks passable English?

54

If you go to your account at AT&T, there will be a link for “upgrade my device”. This will take you to all the phones they offer pre-paid customers. It’s not a big selection but it has cheap to expensive phones. When you order one, you will get instructions on how to transfer it to your account so you won’t lose your phone number or your money.

55

@aurora_maire Thank you for this advice. I don’t think I ever set up an on-line account with them – I have never had any need to. (I do have an on-line account with AT&T for my landline phone and internet, but that’s an altogether separate account.) So I’ll need to look into this.

56

Yes, it is a separate website. I also have AT&T for my internet/TV. This is the link I used for the pre-paid account.
https://www.paygonline.com/websc/loginPage.html

57

@aurora_maire Thank you again. I am going to bookmark that.

Here’s a question for anyone who might know: Should I be looking into upgrading to 4G or 5G? I think I’ve read that 5G isn’t all that widely available yet, as it is still being rolled out in various regions. Is 4G much more widely available?

Do current models of phones operate with both 4G and 5G, whichever type of tower they connect to? If I get a 4G phone, will I just have to upgrade it again in a few years? If I get a 5G phone, it might not work in as many areas for a while, including in possibly in my neck of the wilderness.

58

One thing I didn’t realize the first time this thread went around is all of the other things that relied on 3G network. GM vehicles older that 2014 (?) no longer can use the OnStar features in that vehicle. Near as I can tell, if you had an active OnStar acct, then you may have been upgraded, definitely true for some of the newer vehicles; however, if you had an older vehicle, it won’t work anymore.
If you just acquired a new-to-you car that didn’t have OnStar activated, I’m not sure you can activate it now that the switch off has occurred. Of course, OnStar, in their infinite brilliant wisdom makes you have an acct & enter your acct info to get more information. D’Oh!
It seems that some manufacturers were using 3G tech (for things like remote un/lock) as recently as last year but many more cars still new enough to be on loan or initial lease; despite knowing it would be sunsetted in the near future; it’s not just old beaters that are being impacted.

At some point, it only makes sense that 4G & later on 5G will get shut off as we move to 6, 7, & 8G phones in the upcoming years so the brand new car you might buy in the future, whether next week, next year of a few years down the road would have the same issue of communication failures at some point in the future, well before you might be ready to get rid of it. IOW, this will happen again, & as cars get more connected, it will only be more impactful.

Drive article including a list (of some) of the affected vehicles

59

My town had parking meters that relied on 2G service. Caused all kinds of hell when that was shut down, because the meters ran their batteries dead trying to find service, and went entirely non-functional. That was a fun time.

60

My GM vehicle’s OnStar uses an analog cell radio, and I don’t think it’s worked since 2008 or something. A pretty short lifetime, considering the car is from 2000.

Unfortunately I waited too long to rip it out. Lots of forum posts at the time about people pulling OnStar out of the dash, and replacing it with the cubby that came on non-OnStar vehicles. Those parts don’t seem to be available anymore, so I’ll forever have a green light happily offering something it can never provide. The upside is there are some big buttons to play with that don’t do anything except make the green light flash.

61

4G is ancient in technology years. Yes, it is everywhere that people live in something more sturdy than a yurt.

62

But how much longer will 4G be around before they pull the 4G plug? IIRC I read somewhere that it is expected to be around for a good many years to come, whatever that means. And as you say, it’s everywhere (quite possibly yurts included).

So I’m wondering if I should be looking to upgrade to a 4G phone, which is everywhere and supposedly will be for a while? Or a 5G phone that isn’t everywhere yet but golly gee! it’s the latest whiz-bang we all just must have!

Do any current mobile phones support both? Is that a common thing?