Pricey Phone Plans and Added Fees

Several months ago I purchased an iPhone 4, not necessarily to jump on the hype-bandwagon but because my contract was up for renewal and my provider has always been AT&T.  That being said, I love the phone and I adore the various applications and internet do-dads you can access.  However, these gadgets can come with a heavy price and I’m not referring to the purchase fee.

Earlier this month I received a text from AT&T advising me that I was at 75% usage of my data plan.  For those of you not in the know, AT&T’s 3G service requires that you purchase a monthly data package that allots you a certain number of GBs for uploading/downloading information – if you have a connection to a WiFi network (whether at home or otherwise) internet access and data usage is completely unlimited.  The problem is, I’m not always in range of a WiFi service…especially at my job, where I find that I access my iPhone capabilities the most.

I tried to be careful with my usage in the following weeks, but it wasn’t long before I was notified that a $10 charge had been added to my AT&T bill for going over my data limit.  This is the first time I have encountered this issue in the four/five months that I’ve had the phone, so I suppose it can be considered a one-time fluke, but it is definitely something that I will make myself aware of from now on.  I’m already paying $90 a month for my cellphone service, I don’t need to end up in the triple digits due to web surfing!