US Cellular Joins Other Carriers In Ending Absurd Overage Data Fees

US Cellular has finally woken up to reality and ended its exorbitant fees for customers who consumed more data on their mobile device than their monthly plan allowed. Of course, if you're a US Cellular customer, you'll still be smacked with a fee if you exceed what your plan allots, but it won't be nearly as outrageous as what it used to be.

Back in the day, when data overages were first considered, people were checking their email and maybe checking RSS feeds. So US Cellular, like other carriers, charged users for every megabyte they went over their limit. 25 cents for every megabyte, which ends up tallying to $250 per gigabyte, a rate that by any standard is absolutely ludicrous. That's why Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and others have abandoned that for a much more understandable fee of around $10 per gigabyte overage.

Well, now, US Cellular is doing the same thing. The company offers plans of 300 MB ($20), 2 GB ($25), 4 GB ($45) 5 GB ($50), and 10 GB ($90) per month. If you're on the 300 MB plan, overages are charged at a rate of $10 for every 300 MB, but that plan is kind of irrelevant. For all the others, regardless of which plan you use, if you go over by one megabyte, you'll be charged $10, but if you go over by 900 megabytes you'll still only be charged $10. The tick mark happens at every gigabyte.

[via GigaOM]