If your company has offices in more than three cities, you have probably looked at Lumen and AT&T. They are the default choices for enterprise networks. They both sell fiber, MPLS, SD-WAN, voice, and managed security. They both quote you a long contract.
But they are not the same. Not by a long shot.
Here is what to look at before you sign.
Coverage and last mile
AT&T owns its own copper and fiber across 21 states, mostly in the South, Midwest, and California. Where AT&T owns the building, the quote is fast and the install is faster. Off net, AT&T resells. The price goes up. The install timeline doubles.
Lumen runs the old CenturyLink and Level 3 footprint. That is a bigger backbone than AT&T has, but a smaller building footprint. Lumen is strong in Denver, Phoenix, Seattle, and a lot of the Mountain West. In the Southeast, AT&T usually wins on price because they own the glass.
For an office network spread across cities, the right answer is almost never one carrier for every site. It is AT&T where AT&T owns the building, Lumen where Lumen owns the backbone, and a third carrier in the spots where neither one is lit.
Pricing on the same circuit
We pulled quotes for 1 Gbps dedicated internet at six client sites this spring. Same speed, same SLA, same 36 month term.
In Atlanta, AT&T came in at $895 a month. Lumen came in at $1,240. AT&T owns the building.
In Denver, the numbers flipped. Lumen quoted $785. AT&T quoted $1,395 because they had to ride a third party tail.
In Augusta, neither one was on net. Both came in over $4,000. We took the deal to a regional carrier and got it done for $2,150.
The lesson is simple. The cheaper carrier on any given circuit is the one that owns the last mile to that building. Ask which one that is before you ask for a quote.
Contracts and how they renew
AT&T contracts auto renew for 12 months if you miss the notice window. The window is 60 days. Lumen also auto renews, but the window is 30 days and the renewal rate is sometimes higher than the original.
Put the end date in your calendar the day you sign. Both carriers count on you forgetting. Most companies do.
There is also a tactic worth knowing. AT&T will often hold price on a renewal if you ask 90 days out and threaten to leave. Lumen will too, but you have to escalate past the first rep. The first rep almost never has authority to cut the rate.
MPLS, SD-WAN, and what is actually different
Both carriers sell MPLS. Both sell SD-WAN on top of it. AT&T pushes FlexWare with Cisco or Fortinet gear. Lumen pushes their own SD-WAN with Versa or VMware.
If you already have Cisco everywhere, AT&T is the cleaner integration. If you want a carrier that does not care what gear you run, Lumen is more flexible. The price difference per site is usually under $50 a month. The bigger cost is the install fee, which can run $1,500 to $4,500 per location.
Support, honestly
AT&T support is tiered. Big accounts get a real rep. Small accounts get a queue. The cutoff is roughly $10,000 a month across all your services.
Lumen support is also tiered, but the cutoff is lower and the named rep tends to stay assigned longer. For a company with a dozen locations and a $6,000 monthly bill, Lumen often gives better day to day service.
So which one wins
Neither one, all the time. AT&T wins on price where they own the building. Lumen wins on backbone reach and on accounts in the $5,000 to $15,000 monthly range. Use both. Negotiate one against the other on every renewal.
If you want us to do that work for you, we will.
Related reading
→ AT&T Business overview and pricing → Lumen Business overview and pricing → How to negotiate an enterprise carrier renewal → See a sample bill audit report