AfterDawn: News

AT&T brings up the rear again in Consumer Reports carrier rankings

AT&T has once again placed last in Consumer Report's ranking of the major American carriers.

The report surveyed 63,253 mobile phone subscribers and published their annual report earlier today.



Verizon topped the rankings, followed by Sprint and then T-Mobile USA. Verizon received top marks for customer service, voice quality and data quality. Verizon was first last year, as well.

T-Mobile and Sprint saw average ratings across the board.

On the bright side for AT&T, the carrier received the top ratings for its 4G LTE network, meaning it received less complaints on the service than Verizon or Sprint did. T-Mobile has not begun rolling out their LTE network yet. AT&T also has the fastest LTE, at an average of 9Mbit/s compared to Verizon's 7.5Mbit/s.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 29 Nov 2012 21:38

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• 8 comments

• pollution

  I have seen 2MB/s download on my verizon LTE many times constantly. That capital MB is correct.

  29.11.2012 23:32 #1

• SoTired

  Glad I ditched AT&T years ago. My Verizon 4G connection pretty consistently get 20Mbps data speeds, although it drops slightly depending on the time of day.
  
  I also ditched AT&T's DSL service last month. Years of horrible customer service, dropped connections, and slow speed (3Mbps on a good day). Cox is far from perfect, but for a few dollars more I get consistently 32Mbps.
  
  AT&T is a dinasaur that sits on its ice age infrastructure, refuses to modernize, refuses to repair, and outsources its customer complaints to script-reading, know-nothing Indians who pretend their name is "Mark" and whose primary goal is to make sure I am completely satisfied (as long as it doesn't actually involve fixing my problem).

  30.11.2012 01:46 #2

• ruff469

  Originally posted by SoTired: Glad I ditched AT&T years ago. My Verizon 4G connection pretty consistently get 20Mbps data speeds, although it drops slightly depending on the time of day.
  
  I also ditched AT&T's DSL service last month. Years of horrible customer service, dropped connections, and slow speed (3Mbps on a good day). Cox is far from perfect, but for a few dollars more I get consistently 32Mbps.
  
  AT&T is a dinasaur that sits on its ice age infrastructure, refuses to modernize, refuses to repair, and outsources its customer complaints to script-reading, know-nothing Indians who pretend their name is "Mark" and whose primary goal is to make sure I am completely satisfied (as long as it doesn't actually involve fixing my problem). I take offense to that. I have never been to India a day in my life and the only Indian in my family is American Indian. But I am pure American and yes I am a contract CSR for AT&T. Yes At&T is outsourcing but they have reverted to using Americans, Call center or home based but 100% American now.
  
  But as far as the customer service and network you have to remember that it takes time to upgrade networks. I used to be a heavy cable splicer and it used to take moths to do one block in Manhattan so imagine doing a whole city or even a whole state.
  Of course Cellular is different but it still takes time.
  
  Back to the customer service the reason They contract to people like me is so that the rating will one day return to the top because I get paid based on how good I make the customer feel. It will take time but I believe with people like me servicing the customers the ratings will change.
  
  I personally have sprint and am only with them because the pricing is decent for now but the customer service sucks for me . I can't even get them to waive an upgrade fee let alone a mistake they made on my billing so I don't see how they ranked higher. Plus the Sprint speeds suck and LTE is almost non existent. VZ and T-mobile I have no opinion.
  

  30.11.2012 07:46 #3

• Rebel69

  I ditched Verizon a long time ago after being on I-70 in the middle of Ohio and couldn't get a signal. Signed up with Cingular and it worked well until they were bought out by AT&T...then I suffered with dropped calls and poor customer service. Now I'm on a NO CONTRACT plan with Virgin; unlimited everything for around 50.00/month. I pre-ordered a phone from Republic Wireless, another no contract provider. They're using a customized Android O/S that uses wifi VOIP where available and automatically switches to the cell network when wifi isn't available. The phone's a little expensive, but the monthly fee is extremely reasonable.
  

  IT Consultant
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  30.11.2012 09:26 #4

• lamain

  Well Verizon might have the best network in more areas and the best customer service. But Speaking only for myself I will never go with a company that uses CDMA or any system that makes it hard to reuse a phone on a different carrier. For now I am happy with a small local carrier.

  30.11.2012 12:29 #5

• megadunderhead

  i have at&t and i love my service consumer reports can kiss my iphone
  

  1.12.2012 12:16 #6

• Bladerz05

  so...if you have AT&T, you can send an email, but cant make a phone call...

  1.12.2012 17:27 #7

• blueboy09

  I don't necessary like Verizon's practices they use to screw customers, but down here in the South U.S., Verizon's top king around here. I've yet had to find a more reliable signal on other carriers than Verizon. The only thing I don't like right here is when in the hell are we getting LTE out here in the sticks when LTE service is only 10 minutes away? Doesn't make sense to leave out the small towers out here, but then again when you are insignificant, why the hell do they care anyways?
  

  Chance prepares the favored mind. Look up once in a while and you might learn something. - BLUEBOY

  3.12.2012 19:34 #8