Pay for a discount at AT&T

If your place of employment offers you a discount on your wireless bill, you might want to look a bit deeper into that, especially if it’s AT&T. They have a new policy in place which puts a dent in those savings. Instead of just signing up with your employer and saving, you’ll have to pay a $36 Sponsorship Fee. While this doesn’t completely negate the discount, it does make it a lot less useful. Hopefully you’re in it for the long haul, so that $36 fee turns into just a fraction of what you’ve saved with the company discount.

Laura Northrup of Consumerist examines one possible scenario:

Let’s say that you save 15% on your bill, and have a family plan where the portion of your bill that qualifies for the discount is $70 per month. Saving $10.50 per month, it will take just about seven months to recover the $72 you paid in fees for two lines. Not too bad, on a two-year contract. However, if your two-year contract is up, you’ll need to sign a new one in order to get the discount, as well.

I always envied friends who got corporate discounts on their cell bills. There I was, the sucker paying full price. The $36 fee makes this kind of deal a bit less palatable, but if you’re in it for the long haul it should work out just fine. It’s a pain, but there’s nothing we as consumers can do about it. Except not give our money to AT&T at all. When was the last time we had a widespread boycott of a major company?

About the Author

Joe Pawlikowski is the Senior Editor at MobileMoo.com and has been covering the mobile industry full time since 2007. When he's not writing about the tech scene, he can be found discussing his personal love - baseball (and more specifically the New York Yankees) as well as writing on his personal blog.