I was one of the grandfathered unlimited data plan users and have been an AT&T customer for 9 years. When my bill increased raising my total bill from $172 to $182 a month I finally looked into AT&Ts costs vs their competitors. I realized that I was paying almost double what I could be paying without unlimited data at a competitor. With just two lines with thousands of unused rollover minutes and using a combined data of less than 1.5GB per month. My current plan was overkill. I called AT&T on 3/14 to ask about the increase. They explained the situation and verified that I could terminate with ETF fees waived https://www.att.com/esupport/article.html?source=EC1N0000000wvc00D&wtExtndSource=unltdata#!/wireless/KM1064176 However, they neglected to explain the interuption in service and/or unused month of service I'd have to pay if I didn't time it correctly.
I called AT&T on 3/28 to ask if there was any plan that could get me closer to the $80 tmobiile plan. They told me that because I had two phones under contract (one till June and the other till early 2017) the best they could do was $115 plus taxes/fees. I explained that they were forcing me to leave because the waiving of the ETFs only happened if I left their service. They said that there was nothing they could do. I had until 4/25 to cancel and recieve the waived ETFs. The rep didn't mention that there is no prorating the final bill. The rep also didn't mention that I would have to wait until 4/29 for the next billing cycle to complete and that the phones would remain locked until then.
After my conversation I spent a couple hours at tmobile setting up a new plan and buying a new phone. When I tried calling AT&T to get my phones unlocked I talked with 4 different people. One of whom couldn't believe that I wasn't offered a nearly matching rate. She said that she could have gotten me to the $90. But there is nothing I can do about the $182 for the 3 days of service I used this month. There is no prorating the bill. The final bill will come out on the regular cycle. And nobody mentioned anything about a final bill being mailed. If that is the case it could even be longer. In the meantime, I'm paying for service this month at both AT&T and tmobile and I can't even use one of my phones.
Is there any way possible to get an expedited bill with the waived ETF? The account is shown as cancelled. I hate that I have to pay 180 bucks for something I'm not even using, but I'd pay it right now if I could get my phone unlocked. Is there anything that can be done short of porting back and forth again?
The article I linked makes it seem like canceling service after AT&T raises it rates during a contract period is an easy thing. It clearly is not the case.
Please help.