AT&T Overcharging U.S. Soldiers in Iraq?

This is a potentially explosive story. AT&T had better act quickly to contain the damage control.

It’s bad enough that they overcharge domestic customers but we have alternatives. The soldiers don’t because, according to The Prepaid Press, AT&T has an EXCLUSIVE contract to put payphones in PBXes in Iraq and Afghanistan. But, you ask, can’t the soldiers get cheap calling cards to call the US? No! Because AT&T is using (abusing!) its position as monopoly supplier of payphones to block the 800 numbers necessary to use nonAT&T calling cards...Too bad the soldiers have to pay $.21/minute to call home on them.

The wholesale rate for calls to the US is less than one cent a minute. Skype charges about 1.5 cents RETAIL to call the US from anywhere in the world. You can buy prepaid cards almost anywhere in the world to call the US for less than two cents a minute. AT&T charges soldiers in Iraq twenty-one cents.

AT&T is not this stupid. Obviously, there is some divisional manager who is not willing to do what it takes to make upper management understand the PR danger here.