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Health & Fitness

Helping Heroes Home by Recycling Old Cellphones

Earth day is April 22nd, which makes this a good time to take stock of how we’re treating the environment.  You shut off the water while brushing your teeth. You make sure to throw your recyclables in the right bin, and you turn off lights when you’re not using them.

But when it comes to electronic waste or e-waste, how conscientious are you?   Americans dispose of 152 million mobile devices each year. However, only about 17 million (a little over 10 percent) of these will be collected for recycling.

AT&T and its customers can play an important role in addressing this issue, which is why we want to make recycling those old and unwanted wireless phones easy for everyone.

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Through the AT&T Trade-In Program, customers can turn in old wireless phones and tablets at our company owned retail stores to receive an AT&T credit to purchase other products or to donate the value to the Helping Heroes Home initiative.  This is a program designed to provide emergency funds for returning veterans to help with communication needs as well as physical, emotional and assimilation hardships. Take a look at this video to learn more.

All phones – regardless of manufacturer or date purchased – will be considered for trade-in.

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And in order to protect your privacy, here are some tips to remember before you recycle your wireless phone:

· Remove your phone's SIM card

· Erase your address book, photos, messages and other stored information

· Restore the device factory settings on your device

· For instructions on how to do this, go to the owner's manual or on the manufacturers' web site

Finally, trade them in online by visiting att.com.

Recycling your old, unwanted cellphones helps protect the environment and make a difference in a number of different ways.  AT&T encourages you to do your part.  
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