AT&T microcell to be replaced with cell phone signal boosters

AT&T was able to save face with some of its unhappy customers who were not getting sufficient cell phone signal in their premises by using micro cell that AT&T was able to provide free of cost. Basically, it was the stop gap measure that AT&T came up with so the customers didn’t leave in drones. That strategy was just a band aid for a more sever problem. AT&T made a economical decision to not install newer cell phone towers to serve the communities that were living in the fringes of its existing cell phone towers. They gave away these micro cells that works o wifi signal to make and receive calls & texts. This was a relief to a lot of customers for a while and when they noticed that this solution came with a catch and that is the wifi signal cost. The DSL connection added an extra 20-30 bucks to the 80 + dollar bill on their phone payments.

The intermittent dropped calls that pestered the calls due to an in effective hand shake gave rose to more problems. The wifi signal operated in a whole separate bandwidth then the cell phone frequency and that means that any time then wifi signal is used to make or receive calls included a step where there is a interchange of frequency bandwidth that needs to happen in order for this to work. That was not always seamless and peppered with issues that lead to dropped calls or calls being able to be made and when the receiver picks up the call the call dropped.

Another issue was when the wifi signal drops the ball on the cell phone signal it starts to bite into the data plan of the cell phone service and as a result caught some customers by surprise that their phone bill got more expensive as the result. AT&T has stopped shipping these micro cells as alternatives for bad or poor reception since it does not make economical sense for the consumer and strategic sense for AT&T to keep supporting this band aid fix rather addressing the core issue which is setting up more cell towers or assist its customers to obtain a cellular booster which unlike the micro cell directly talks to the cell phone tower in the same frequency the towers operate. However AT&T has promised to keep support for the existing micro cell users until it phases it out completely.