Ralph de la Vega, CEO of AT&T mobility, has revealed that his company will soon be offering shared family data plans. These plans will allow users to pay for a single data plan that covers multiple devices – smartphones and tablets, namely. Under the current system a family with, say, two iPhones and a 4G iPad have to pay separate data plan fees for each device. With shared data plans, customers would pay for a single data plan that would cover all the family’s devices.
In an interview with CNet at the CTIA conference in New Orleans yesterday, de la Vega said that he was “very comfortable with the plan that will be offered to our customers.” He did not give any details about the plan other than that. Pricing, data caps, and the like are still unknown. He also declined to say when AT&T would be rolling out the new plans.
De la Vega’s statements make AT&T the second major carrier to promise that shared data plans would be coming soon. During Verizon’s quarterly earnings call last month the company revealed, among other things, that family data plans would be coming in mid-summer. Depending on pricing, such plans have the potential to be extremely popular, especially among families that own 3G or 4G tablets like the iPad.
While T-Mobile has said they do not intend to offer a family data plan, Sprint already offers their Everything Data Family plan, which includes unlimited data for all devices on the account and starts at $129 (for 2 lines and 1500 minutes).
What do you think? Would you make the switch to a family data plan? Let us know in the comments.