The word hitting the net now is that according to the WSJ, is that AT&T has taken a hammering in the past from its iPhone customers over poor coverage, and with the rumours of a Verizon iPhone in the works AT&T is gearing up for that battle by working to reduce dropped calls and speed up web surfing.

Execs back in mid December delivered a 100 day plan to drastically improve the AT&T network in “densely populated” areas, again according to people “familiar with the plan” and since that time the Big Blue has added new network spectrum so they can handle traffic better, wired extra neighbourhood cell towers with faster connections, and repositioned antennas to improve reception.

However, even though AT&T has made these moves to improve service their network still doesn’t meet with the quality standards their customers are looking for and apparently last month a poll conducted by J.D. Power & Associates revealed that AT&T is still poor in call quality when compared to its Big Red rival.

Defending their efforts, AT&T has said they expect to spend $2 billion this year on build-outs and add twice as much capacity, although apparently a spokesperson didn’t offer any insight on AT&T’s spending last year. AT&T do argue though that growing pains with the iPhone gives them a better position to deliver better service than rivals who may gain the iPhone for the first time.