AT&T Promises Bill Credits For Future Outages

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: AT&T, following last year's embarrassing botched update that kicked every device off its wireless network and blocked over 92 million phone calls, is now promising full-day bill credits to mobile customers for future outages that last at least 60 minutes and meet certain other criteria. A similar promise is being made to fiber customers for unplanned outages lasting at least 20 minutes, but only if the customer uses an AT&T-provided gateway. The 'AT&T Guarantee' announced today has caveats that can make it possible for a disruption to not be covered. AT&T says the promised mobile bill credits are 'for wireless downtime lasting 60 minutes or more caused by a single incident impacting 10 or more towers.'

The full-day bill credits do not include a prorated amount for the taxes and fees imposed on a monthly bill. The 'bill credit will be calculated using the daily rate customer is charged for wireless service only (excludes taxes, fees, device payments, and any add-on services,' AT&T said. If an outage lasts more than 24 hours, a customer will receive another full-day bill credit for each additional day. If only nine or fewer AT&T towers aren't functioning, a customer won't get a credit even if they lose service for an hour. The guarantee kicks in when a 'minimum 10 towers [are] out for 60 or more minutes resulting from a single incident,' and the customer 'was connected to an impacted tower at the time the outage occurs,' and 'loses service for at least 60 consecutive minutes as a result of the outage.'

The guarantee 'excludes events beyond the control of AT&T, including but not limited to, natural disasters, weather-related events, or outages caused by third parties.' AT&T says it will determine 'in its sole discretion' whether the disruption is 'a qualifying' network outage. 'Consumers will automatically receive a bill credit equaling a full day of service and we'll reach out to our small business customers with options to help make it right,' AT&T said. When there's an outage, AT&T said it will 'notify you via e-mail or SMS to inform you that you've been impacted. Once the interruption has been resolved, we'll contact you with details about your bill credit.' If AT&T fails to provide the promised credit for any reason, customers will have to call AT&T or visit an AT&T store.

To qualify for the similar fiber-outage promise, 'customers must use AT&T-provided gateways,' the firm said. There are other caveats that can prevent a home Internet customer from getting a bill credit. AT&T said the fiber-outage promise 'excludes events beyond the control of AT&T, including but not limited to, natural disasters, weather-related events, loss of service due to downed or cut cable wires at a customer residence, issues with wiring inside customer residence, and power outages at customer premises. Also excludes outages resulting from planned maintenance.' AT&T notes that some residential fiber customers in multi-dwelling units 'have an account with AT&T but are not billed by AT&T for Internet service.' In the case of outages, these customers would not get bill credits but would be given the option to redeem a reward card that's valued at $5 or more.

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