AT&T Drops DSL Price, But Not Really > That's how they lost their huge adds

reply to Dogfather

Re: That's how they lost their huge adds

I'm not sure that it is. Given the opportunity to up-sell, and the tie to overpriced POTS it sure looks like it would still be a net gainer for them. At $15 it was a big gainer for them.

How do you figure? The cost of a DSL modem and a truck roll for the install means it requires many months to move a customer into the black. We're not talking Comcast subcontractors here, AT&T's a union shop and they pay good wages to techs.

People seem to have an idea in their head about how much something "should" cost (thanks in no small part to people like BBR's own Karl, who skews every news story to further his views and manipulates statistics or manufatures meaningless metrics to try to prove a point). When one's world view dictates that all corporations are inherently evil and out to screw the little guy, it's an easy trap to fall into, but it's not intellectually valid.

Because you have hundreds of customers paying to support a single truck roll. Your math requires everyone to have a truck roll and ignores the fixed costs of providing DSL. There are many costs that are the same whether they're providing service to 1 customer or 1000.

It's the same as insurance. It's pooled premiums that allow an insurer to pay off a claim. A single claim taken against a single insured will look like a losing proposition every time. But for every insured that takes a claim, there are hundreds or thousands that don't.

There is no skewing the annual report. Data services were and are profitable and those margins increased when they had these cheap DSL deals. Without them we see clearly that they get no new customers.