MicroCell End of Life Has Been Announced

@OttoPylot

"AT&T is not turning off your MicroCell. They will just stop selling them online come Jan. 1st and end official support at the end of next year. The option to automatically choose cellular over WiFi is not AT&T's decision. That is purely a function of the phone mfr."

This is not correct.  They are ending sales at the end of this year and ending support sometime next year which means my microcell will almost certainly stop working sometime next year.  As far as this being a function of the phone mfr this is also incorrect.  Both iPhones and Android phones that support wifi calling have the capability to prefer Wifi over cellular and it is available on Verizon and T-Mobile but AT&T has disabled it on their phones.  On iPhone they just use a carrier profile to do this and on android phones since they control the firmware of their branded phones they have just turned this feature off.  This is not a phone mfg issue this is an at&t issue.

End of Support doesn’t necessarily mean they will turn it off.   With the number of M-cells in use, ATT can’t do that.  There are “unsupported” m-cells in use by prepiad customers out there.  

@nwhaynes - I disagree about the EOL. That does not mean AT&T will "flip the switch" at the end of 2018. It just means that they will stop support as in phone support. Yes, they will probably at some point in time break the connection but my guess is that the mobility server part will stay functional after 2018 as @lizdance40 mentioned using the legacy pre paid accounts as an example. Things move slowly in AT&T.

When AT&T first introduced WiFi-C, the iPhone was the only phone capable of that (iPhone 6). At that point in time, it was solely a firmware issue with the iPhone as far as connection preference goes. That may have changed with the carrier upgrades with each new iteration of the iPhone models and iOS. On my iPhone SE, which is an unlocked iPhone purchased from Apple,  there is no setting that I am aware of that allows me to automatically have the phone choose which connection technology to use. If I have WiFi-C enabled, and Airplane Mode off, the phone will always attempt to connect to the cellular tower signal (with the Microcell disabled) and not find my WiFi signal. It has been suggested that AT&T is in fact controlling the WiFi-C connection to "force" customers to upgrade to newer phones but I haven't seen solid evidence of that, even though I wouldn't put it past AT&T.

The bottom line is that the MicroCell is going away. Partially in the near future and probably completely sometime after 2018. The technology is old and can not keep up with the demands of modern home networks so WiFi-C is the next best thing outside of purchasing a cellular booster, which can be pricey but very effective. @lizdance40 is correct in that AT&T is going to lose a lot of customers over this, and it will be somewhat of a PR problem for them, but they just don't want to spend the time and resources on keeping it as a current viable option for poor in-home coverage. What they did instead was "modernize" the WHP (Wireless Home Phone) product so that it can also be used not only in conjunction with the MicroCell and wireless handsets, but as an internet connection as well.

@OttoPylot   Lol.  Like they “support” it now!   😆😆😆.  There is a reason I bought an M-cell off eBay and another off a forum member.   I’ve seen enough posts on here to know ATT has no idea how it works and didn’t know they sold such a thing.   

@OttoPylot

There is an option on the Verizon branded iPhone and the T-mobile branded iPhone.  I just saw it two days ago on someone's Verizon iPhone when I turned on their WiFi calling.  AT&T has taken it out with their carrier profile for some reason.

On my Galaxy s6 there was an option for this as well but again at&t disabled it in the menu so you couldn't toggle that feature on and off.  I used a settings editor on my s6 and was able to re-enable the feature.  It was present on other carriers version of the phone.  AT&T is purposefully not letting you enable the feature for some reason.

@nwhaynes - as I said, if AT&T is purposely disabling that feature it's probably so they can hopefully sell more AT&T branded or locked phones. Our phones are unlocked and not branded but I don't see that feature so it probably was disabled initially when AT&T first rolled out WiFi-C on iPhones (the first phones to have it on AT&T and I think other carriers as well). It could be that AT&T is trying to grab more income via roaming or whatever so they make auto-WiFi-C difficult. Whatever the reason, AT&T is not going to change because the suits that make these decisions are out of touch with the customer needs/wants. The only option the customer has now is to deal with the current situation or move to another carrier that seems to be more in tune with the customer, for whatever that means.

I owe no special allegiance to AT&T and receive nothing from them so it makes no difference to me. My service has always worked well for so there's no reason to change. However, should we choose to do so we can just take our phones with us and enjoy whatever better options/features another carrier has to offer, if any. All of them, in my opinion, do whatever they can to "mess" with the customer so as to increase the bottom line. If you walk, you walk. They don't care.

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@lizdance40 wrote:

@OttoPylot   Lol.  Like they “support” it now!   😆😆😆.  There is a reason I bought an M-cell off eBay and another off a forum member.   I’ve seen enough posts on here to know ATT has no idea how it works and didn’t know they sold such a thing.   

    

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True that. I wonder what AT&T will do if myself and @Avedis53 finally decide to stop supporting the MicroCell.

@OttoPylot even if you are using an unlocked iphone you are still running the at&t carrier profile so you can be on their network.  That carrier profile is what is causing that not to show up on your phone.

@nwhaynes - doesn't make any difference how or why it's happening. AT&T is not going to change it so you'll just have to deal with it. Sounds harsh I know but there is nothing we can do here in the forums. Maybe if enough people write to AT&T and complain they'll listen and change the profile.

@OttoPylot I realize there is nothing that can be done here, I am just saying that it makes wifi calling practically worthless and and not a viable alternative to the microcell until they let you do that.  The only suggestion I have seen anywhere is to turn your LTE setting to Data Only and that doing this might cause it to switch to wifi calling more consistently but I haven't tested it.  I am happy to keep chugging along on my mcell until they shut it down.  Once they do that I will likely find a different carrier.