Smartphone Thoughts: AT&T Disables VPN Access on Motorola Q9h Global

"I am on my 12th windows mobile device (not a novice user, just for context for this rant). I purchased the AT&T Q Global yesterday, being pleased with the specs, form fact etc. Then my disappointment and frustration with AT&T hit an all time high! They disabled, removed and otherwise made unavailable the VPN connection capabilities of the device! Thats right, when I contacted the AT&T biz tech support they pushed me straight into a corporate sales rep to try to sell me an enterprise connectivity solution. Now I admit I am not a true technology professional, but it appears that AT&T has hit a new level of incomprehensible arrogance with this move. Disabiling core WM6 functionality to drive enterprise solution sales?!? I hope I am wrong and I hope to see someone prove me wrong on this! I look forward to reading more about this."

A few days ago one of our readers, Mike Cioce, sent us this email to make us as well as our readers aware of this issue. Since that time I have spent a few hours on the phone with several of my contacts that are still working for AT&T as well as their Business technical support. Unfortunately, no one can give me a straight answer as to whether or not this is the case with AT&T's data network. While I am 100% positive that an account representative gave this information to Mike, from personal experience I have learned that AT&T's customer service representatives tend to be some of the most ill trained "experts" of any carrier... and I was right since no one knew for sure if this is the case or not! As a word of caution to any of our readers that are interested in purchasing this handset, especially for it's VPN abilities, prepare to pay out the nose for the Enterprise Connectivity solutions.

Now before anyone starts revolting in outrage, I can for the most part explain why a company such as AT&T might take this approach. When I worked for AT&T (formally Cingualr) it was common knowledge that the individuals that usually used these features did so for their business needs and would usually consume a large portion of data every month. Way more than the the standard consumer could every use. Realistically it would be a horrible business move for AT&T to not charge customers that are using those features an extra data cost! While I understand the frustration of being locked out of a feature your phone supports at the same time I understand that business customers can afford to spend more on their bills every month, especially with the amount of data they consume.