NEW YORK — AT&T Inc. said it will eliminate its cheaper $10 monthly text-messaging plan for new customers in favor of a $20 unlimited option.
The carrier said it will stop offering the $10 plan beginning Sunday, though existing customers with the 1,000-text-limit option can keep it as long as they remain AT&T customers. For $10 monthly, customers at rival Verizon Wireless get 500 texts and those with Sprint Nextel Corp. get 1,000 texts.
Texting is one of the carriers’ most profitable enterprises. A single text may cost AT&T or Verizon less than a tenth of a cent to transmit, said Piper Jaffray analyst Chris Larsen.
“Even if you’ve got a heavy texter on an $20 unlimited plan who sends 10,000 texts in a given month, that’s still a profit for the carriers,” Larsen said.
An AT&T spokesman said it was making the change because the “vast majority” of its customers were already using unlimited plans.
AT&T shares recently fell 2.1 percent to $28.55 amid a broader market sell-off.
Dow Jones Newswire
