Staff numbers at US telco giant AT&T and its recently integrated Time Warner subsidiary fell by nearly 11,000 during the first nine months of 2018 amid reports of cutbacks at US call centers and following the loss of around 27,500 jobs in the previous two years. Last year's cuts, represent around 4% of total jobs across AT&T Inc. and Time Warner at the end of 2017, and happened as rival carriers T-Mobile US Inc. and Sprint Corp. were lobbying hard for a merger that could further decimate the workforce in the US telecom sector.