Technology Futures

AT&T billing runs amok

Submitted by admin on Mon, 08/13/2007 - 08:49.

iPhone users are starting to get bills from AT&T (which is really SBC), and the bills are apparently stupefyingly detailed. This article describes 52 page, double-sided bills that include detail on billing items that cost $0.00. Apparently one of the problems is that even if you have an "unlimited" data plan (for using the Web and email features of the iPhone, AT&T provides billing line items for every time you access the 'net, even if there is no charge for such access.

This is yet another example of IT departments run amok, along with accountants and bookkeepers who apparently lack common sense. Margins on cellphone accounts are already slim; it makes you wonder who is responsible at AT&T for looking at the cost of postage. How can the company afford to mail out a 52 page bill?