Coronavirus is Shifting the Communications Industry

With COVID-19 urging people to remain at home, many telecommunications companies have started to make concessions to make life easier for their customers. Whether it is used for entertainment, work, or communication, Internet access is crucial right now, and so ISPs and cell carriers are taking steps to help facilitate this. 

What follows are the measures that the major providers are now enacting via their offers to their customers.

AT&T

• Late payments no longer incur fees or termination of service
• AT&T hotspots are now publicly accessible
• Eliminated data caps and overage fees

Comcast

• Late payments no longer incur fees or termination of service
• Comcast hotspots are now publicly accessible
• Comcast’s 1TB data cap is paused
• Data speeds are boosted to 25/3 megabits per second
• All new and existing Internet Essentials customers get two months of complimentary service

Spectrum

• Two months of 100Mbps broadband and Wi-Fi is free to households with kids still in school or college
• Spectrum hotspots are now publicly accessible

T-Mobile (Including Sprint, Post-Merger)

• Late payments no longer incur fees or termination of service
• Unlimited data and 20GB of hotspot data
• Free calls to select countries impacted by COVID-19

Verizon

• Late payments no longer incur fees or termination of service for residences or small businesses
• Verizon hotspots are now publicly accessible
• The shift to 5G service has been accelerated

Of course, there is no guarantee that these changes will continue once the coronavirus situation has been reduced or resolved. However, there is no telling how consumers will react to returning to how things once were--so there may be some prospect of these changes becoming a little more permanent.

How has your business coped with the effects of the coronavirus outbreak? Tell us in the comments!