Carriers Blame the iPhone For Data Caps and Increased Upgrade Fees

zacharye writes "Bruised mobile carriers such as AT&T and Verizon are 'fighting back' against Apple's iPhone, despite the fact that the device has helped them eke out consistently higher average revenue per wireless subscribers since its launch. To hear the carriers tell it, the iPhone is a major inhibitor to their profits as last year they were 'only' generating wireless service profit margins in the 38% to 42% range. But ever since these beleaguered companies started 'fighting back' by implementing data caps, increasing fees for device upgrades and implementing longer waiting periods before users can switch devices, they’ve seen their wireless service profit margins surge. AT&T reported a 45% margin in Q2 2012 and Verizon reported a record-high 49% margin."

US problem, not the iPhone

[Pieroxy]

In other news, in other parts of the world, some carriers just do manage their infrastructure correctly and the prices are actually going down instead of going up.

So please, stop blaming the customers and start rethinking your now-stinking strategy.

Re:Victims of their own greed

[KingSkippus]

And since I'm on Verizon and they now need to remove the $20 per month tethering charge I will be tethering everything.

Removing the tethering charge does not apply to people on unlimited data plans. [zdnet.com] It's either/or. Either you get on one of their bandwidth-cap plans and have free tethering, or you continue to pay the fee for tethering. I'm not passing judgment on whether that's fair or not, just pointing it out.

Re:why are american corporations so incompetent?

[jandrese]

Um, the barriers to entry for a wireless carrier are hardly artificial. They're limited by spectrum, a shared and extremely limited resource that they're granted a monopoly over by the government. That's why you can't just start up your own competing cell company, the spectrum is already allocated to the incumbents. That's why most countries regulate their cell providers, because the monopoly situation makes it impossible for proper competition to form. That's also why countries with lax regulation end up with sky high cell phone prices and poor service.

Re:38% profit margin?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's just obscene!

It is almost as much as Apple's profit margin on the iPhone (around 50%)

Re:Victims of their own greed

[fahrbot-bot]

i was at the beach last month and my iphone was SLOW. i look around and every other person has a smart phone.

Hmm... Seems you and the others were using the beach wrong. Not trying to judge, but put down the phone and enjoy the surf, sand and sun.

Re:Charge Apple Users More then

[R3d M3rcury]

Now perhaps us iPhone users like our phones and actually use them more than android folks, but I don't think that's really the case.

Yet, it appears to be true [cultofmac.com]