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1. I am not shocked that AT&T would do this, with any new advancement like they have there is bound to be support and network issues, if I recall correctly they had some major issues with the network at first. I am sure they even told the employees to downplay the bills to get the phones out of the door.

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   1. MBoro Comp Repair on September 10th, 2008 at 5:51 am

2. T-Mobile does not bill in advance. I had them for two years before I just got the iphone and the double-sized AT&T bill. With T-Mobile, the first bill is ONLY the pro-rated amount, so it is less than the amount of one full bill.

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   2. Mark on September 5th, 2008 at 10:44 am

3. There’s actually a summary that prints out when they print your contract (for AT&T, again, when I worked at an agent location ~2 years ago) that details this. However, when I was working there, I found that it *really* confused customers, and never gave it. I *would* however, make sure to give a quick rundown like I did above (estimating taxes, stating 3-4 times that their first bill would be bigger than planned). Most people caught it, but we had a few associates who always forgot to cover that part, and it typically came back to bite them in the backside, when the customer came back ~45 days later with this huge bill.

   I agree, though, you should have been informed correctly, which you obviously weren’t.

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   3. Ricky on August 11th, 2008 at 10:26 am

4. Thanks, Ricky. I don’t know whether “all” mobile providers do this — though AT&T seems to. I’ve heard that T-Mobile doesn’t.

   But in any event, this is something that the carriers (and anyone setting up a carrier account, like tha Apple store reps selling iPhones) should know about and communicate to new customers. As I said, I specifically asked what to expect with my first month’s bill, and I was given wildly incorrect information that threw off my budget for this month. That was a nasty shock, and got my customer relationship with AT&T off to a very bad start.

   - Amy Gahran

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   4. Amy Gahran on August 11th, 2008 at 8:13 am

5. It’s not just iPhone service that AT&T bills in advance - it’s all service, and it’s been that way for years (T-Mobile and Sprint do it, too. I can’t personally vouch for Verizon, but I believe they do, too).

   The cell companies have several ‘billing days’ throughout the month, so that all monthly billing periods end on one of these set days. Thus, your first bill should include:

   1. Activation fee ($36 last time I checked, could have changed though)
   2. A full month’s service
   3. Pro-rated service, based on the time between when you started service and and the next ‘billing day’.

   For example, if you start service on the 5th, and the next billing date is the 15th, you’ll have 10 days of ‘pro-ration’. To determine the charge, they simply take your monthly bill, divide by 30, and then multiply by however many pro-rated days. So…the starting iPhone bill is what, $60? (I honestly don’t know). Assuming the above dates, your bill should be:

   $36 + $60 + $20 (60/30=2, x10 days) + $15 (taxes and fees. These taxes and fees vary by state. In Texas, they’re roughly 17% or so.) = $131 for your first monthly bill, roughly.

   I sold cell phone service at an agent location (which offered AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint) for 4 years, and that is how the first bill looked all that time, for any of the above three carriers.

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   5. Ricky on August 10th, 2008 at 8:17 am