Due Date Change

AT&T didn't change the billing end date, they just changed the number of days after the billing end date until your bill is due to 21 days. That is the reason you have to pay 2 bills in one month. If you would check the billing end dates of your bills, you would see that those did not change. You are still being billed for the same amount of days, just now your bill is going to be due a few days earlier.

Look at your bills and see the dates for which you are being billed, they will be different. ATT changed due dates to make them standard for everyone. Since your new due date is the 28th, that means your billing cycle ends on the 7th (see article on due date change here). Your billing cycle did not change, just the amount of time until payment is due. The bill due on July 2nd was probably for service from June 8 to July 7 and your bill due on July 28th is probably for service from July 8 to Aug 7.

If your old due date was the 2nd, that means they gave you 25 days to pay your bill, now you only get 21 days, same for everyone.

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@21stNow wrote:

You're not being ripped off.  Due to the timing of when your bill was due in the past (close to the beginning of the month), your new timing moves your due date to the end of the month, which will make you have 13 payments in the 2015 calendar year.  You are also paying for 13 billing periods, so there is no rip-off here.  Since billing periods can overlap calendar years, that can throw off the thinking behind what you are actually paying for when you are billed.

 

I will give an example based on the assumption in sandblaster's email regarding your billing cycle dates, using a hypothetical billing amount:

 

Due date:                        Billing Cycle:                Billing Amount:

1/2/15                             12/8/14-1/7/15              $100

2/2/15                              1/8/15-2/7/15               $100

3/2/15                              2/8/15-3/7/15               $100

4/2/15                              3/8/15-4/7/15               $100

5/2/15                              4/8/15-5/7/15               $100

6/2/15                              5/8/15-6/7/15               $100

7/2/15                              6/8/15-7/7/15               $100

7/28/15                            7/8/15-8/7/15               $100

8/28/15                            8/8/15-9/7/15               $100

9/28/15                            9/8/15-10/7/15             $100

10/28/15                          10/8/15-11/7/15           $100

11/28/15                          11/8/15-12/7/15            $100

12/28/15                          12/8/15-1/7/16             $100

 

Hopefully, that clears it up for you.

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@21stNow

I marked this as solved because this is the best explanation I have seen on this problem.

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@Kris.121212 wrote:
I understand that my billing cycle did not change. What I'm trying to understand is how I'm not paying more when I'll now be paying 13 payments this year instead of 12. Say my bill was $100 a month for easy math's sake. I paid $100 Jan 2 and every month on the 2nd including July 2. That is 7 months which totals $700. Now I have $100 payment due July 28. I'm up to a total of $800. I will have a payment due Aug 28 and every month on the 28th through Dec. 28. That's another 5 months which totals $500. Add this to the $800 I'll have already paid through July and I'm up to $1300. Prior to AT&T changing my Due Date (or number of days) I would have only paid $100 for 12 months which totals $1200. How is paying $1300 in a year "the same" as paying $1200 in a year??? I know there is a new type of math they are teaching in schools now, but this does NOT add up to being equal. Please show me the math if I'm wrong.

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Deleted my post because @GLIMMERMAN76's explanation was much better then mine.

Thanks Glimmerman76!

Had the same problem.  They changed my due date and I did not authorize such a change.  I was never notified and when I went to pay I was told there was no way to change anything and ATT does not report to credit monitoring service.  But I checked it and it was reported late.  A manager Jessie was supposed to get me a letter saying ATT does not report to credit bureau but nothing ever came.  Now I find I have two bills one due on the 1st of August (the new date) and one due on the 4th of August (old date) for more AND showing that the first bill is overdue.  Not sure how it can be overdue when 1 August is not even here yet.  ATT has gotten out of control.  Of course at this hour of the night no one is available to fix this.  Probably time to find another cell phone carrier.

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@Kris.121212 wrote:
First of all, I am completely aware that billing cycles can cross calendar years. I was only using a Janthru Dec example to keep it simple. My math is the same if I use a Janthru Dec time-frame or any other 12 month time-frame which includes this July. Secondly, the explanation is trying to show that I'm paying for services not fully received, and that's not the case. The explanation provided is using an example as though my bill due on July 28 will be for a billing cycle of July 8 - Aug 7 and that's not true. AT&T is not fronting me from Jul 28 - Aug 7. In fact all of the examples are showing a due date covering a billing cycle that over-laps. My bill due on July 28 is for billing cycle of June 8 - July 7. But at this point, between Customer Service folks I talk with not having any idea how this is working out to be equal, my math which shows that in any 12 month period of time which includes this July I will be making 13 payments, and the rationale provided on this forum (that everyone is agreeing with) which tries to explain this by showing I'm paying for services I haven't received yet, I have a headache. Thank you for your time and attempts: I'll pay my additional July bill and let AT&T get it's13th payment. I guess I don't have to understand or even think it is fair, as my bill is due whether I agree with it or not. It's up to the FCC to do the auditing. Again thank you for your time.

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OK.  I had to make an assumption as I didn't know your actual billing cycle and related payment due dates from your original post.  I could change the dates to match accurate information, but it would still have the same result.  As long as your billing cycle doesn't change so that you are paying for the same service dates twice, you aren't being ripped off.  If the billing cycle stays the same, the payment due date can be at any time.  You would only pay for any particular service date once, not twice.

Another example from another area of life is to consider two hourly workers who make the same amount of money and work the same amount of hours.  One gets paid bi-weekly and one gets paid semi-monthly.  Even though one gets paid 26 times in a year and the other 24 times in a year, they still earn the same amount of money over the course of that year, regardless of when they get paid.