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The Almighty Buck Cellphones

T-Mobile Is Raising Prices On Some of Its Older Plans (cnet.com) 68

In a memo sent to employees, T-Mobile said it will be raising prices on some of its older plans, starting with the next bill. CNET reports: The memo was sent out by Jon Freier, president of T-Mobile's consumer group. The note doesn't list which plans are affected, but Freier specifically says that those on the carrier's latest assortment of Go5G plans will not see their prices increase. The same goes for the "millions of customers" who are covered by T-Mobile's Price Lock guarantee, which he says will continue to be in effect for those people. Freier says in the memo that T-Mobile is raising prices on older plans "for the first time in nearly a decade" and that the increases are designed to "keep up with rising inflation and costs."

It isn't known exactly how many people will be affected by the change. The note says that it will affect a "small portion" of T-Mobile's customers. Those with free lines from the carrier will not see increases on those lines, T-Mobile confirmed to CNET. The company expects to notify all affected customers on Wednesday.

T-Mobile previously tried to move customers on older, generally cheaper plans to some of its newer, pricier ones last year, only to back off the plan amid backlash. Whereas with that move people had the option to call T-Mobile's support and push back against the change, a source familiar with the company's plans tells CNET that this option won't be available with this new rate hike.

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T-Mobile Is Raising Prices On Some of Its Older Plans

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  • Sprint's management and culture have infested T-Mobile.

    • by mjwx ( 966435 )
      I'm not an American, I live in a country with good consumer protection but I cant see a problem here.

      Costs go up over time, inflation, the telcos are paying more for wages, electricity, parts and equipment, it seems fair that they should be able to raise their prices. Once you're out of contract it's not illegal either, they're under no obligation to provide the same service for the same price. Personally I'd rather an open increase in price over a subtle and opaque degradation in service.

      Here in the
      • Re:Just like Boeing (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Entrope ( 68843 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @08:37AM (#64493213) Homepage

        Some of these plans -- like mine, which is going up by $2/month -- were advertised explicitly as never raising rates for as long as the customer keeps the contract. So there is a little basis for being upset, if someone is being (IMO) unreasonable. They announced last year that they were going to move a bunch of us to newer, pricier plans; fortunately they cancelled that after people were (justifiably) upset.

        Other than that, this really is the first time T-Mobile has announced a price increase for my decade-old plan. They are fairly behind inflation, and there have been some improvements to the service like 5G and improved international roaming, so I don't think this bump is unreasonable. If someone wants to optimize for low cost, they can go to a prepaid plan.

        • by sodul ( 833177 )

          I'm mildly annoyed by this but not enough to switch. I'm on an old plan where the 3rd line is free, so I have 3 unlimited lines for $80-100/month (going over 2GB on the first 2 lines causes an extra $10, then it is really unlimited data). So now we should pay $90-110 for the 3 lines.

          • by tomz16 ( 992375 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @09:21AM (#64493353)

            I'm mildly annoyed by this but not enough to switch

            Weird! It's almost as if this move were calculated to elicit this exact reaction. Don't worry, they will keep raising your prices periodically, but never enough to shock the (average) customer into leaving!

            • Weird! It's almost as if this move were calculated to elicit this exact reaction. Don't worry, they will keep raising your prices periodically, but never enough to shock the (average) customer into leaving!

              Right.. Because we don't have an annual inflation rate (combined with the massive spike we've seen over the last few years).. So a company should be fine with less revenue (in terms of value) year after year.

              You people are incapable of critical thinking.

              • Right.. Because we don't have an annual inflation rate (combined with the massive spike we've seen over the last few years).. So a company should be fine with less revenue (in terms of value) year after year.

                One of the plans they increased featured a 'price lock' guarantee. That is the plan I have. A few mins ago I reached out to TMobile to ask how the price lock actually works if my price goes up. "What is actually being locked?" Their response? "I need 48 hours to research this and get back to you..."

                From your remark about critical thinking I don't think you're fully aware of the nuance, here. TMobile made promises and are now reneging on them.

                • One of the plans they increased featured a 'price lock' guarantee. That is the plan I have. A few mins ago I reached out to TMobile to ask how the price lock actually works if my price goes up. "What is actually being locked?" Their response? "I need 48 hours to research this and get back to you..."

                  I have an update on this. I ended up needing to reach out to TMob again and I used their 'virtual assitant'. That thing is an AI chatbot that ... Im not sure why I called it AI because it's so dumb it couldn't even tell me their call center hours... even siri has it beat... anyway sorry I used their chatbot and the first thing it does is say "whatcha need?" This time the phrase I entered included the phrase 'price lock'. I don't know if that triggered something but I suspect it because every other ti

              • "So a company should be fine with less revenue (in terms of value) year after year."

                What if they make more from taking out derivative hedges on their own stock than they get from subscriptions?

          • US Mobile has unlimited (35 GB hi-speed, 1 Mbps after that) talk/text/data for 3+ lines on T-Mobile's network for $25/line. The only reason I can think of to stick with T-Mobile is data prioritization but that really hasn't been an issue in the 4+ years I've been with US Mobile.

          • I'm mildly annoyed by this but not enough to switch. I'm on an old plan where the 3rd line is free, so I have 3 unlimited lines for $80-100/month (going over 2GB on the first 2 lines causes an extra $10, then it is really unlimited data). So now we should pay $90-110 for the 3 lines.

            As a fellow T-Mobile customer I'd ask you to raise an objection with them. (blowback got them to back down before...) The reason I'd tell you it's worth your time is that they lure people in to link Autopay to a debit card with a pretty healthy discount. I dunno if that affects you or not but it does mean they can just pull what they want from those customers' bank accounts. It's not right and their post-Sprint-merger seems to have lit a fire under them to nickel-and-dime people in dangerous ways.

            I'm jus

        • Sounds like you MIGHT have a case for a lawsuit.

          Have you spoken to a competent lawyer about the merits of your claim?

          • by syn3rg ( 530741 )

            Sounds like you MIGHT have a case for a lawsuit.

            One where the lawyer pockets millions and you get your $2 back.

      • " Personally I'd rather an open increase in price over a subtle and opaque degradation in service."

        What if this false dilemma is based on a frightfully zero-sum economics that says more about your ideology than the need to raise prices?

        In other words, what if you looked at T-Mobile's real books and saw that they were making far more profit from investing in financial markets than they make from subscription fees? What if they are telling a tall tale about inflation costs which may have a grain of truth to t

  • Move over to mint, Google Fi, cricket, etc yet?
    • Move over to mint, Google Fi, cricket, etc yet?

      Lack of cool commercials the kids don’t really like anymore?

    • Who says they won't?

      My AT&T plan is $25/month for 16 gigs of data I barely touch with roll over. 16 is more than enough for many people.

      I look at Verizon every couple years and they're always really expensive for nothing special. I don't see why anyone uses them.

      • by FictionPimp ( 712802 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @09:19AM (#64493345) Homepage

        I use Verizon because I want my phone to work. Where I live ATT will only work on wifi. I've tried a few MNVOs and none work as well as just Verizon out here in the middle of nowhere.

      • AT&T isn't as cheap as they look. One of them tried haggling me at Costco, advertised low prices and I asked if it was just an intro price that would increase. He swore multiple times to me that it wouldn't. I asked to see the fine print, sure as shit that's exactly what it does.

        And that didn't even get into all of the "just because" fees they slap on it. After that, even the intro plan was already more expensive than my tmo plan before, and then it just goes up even higher later.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Move over to mint, Google Fi, cricket, etc yet?

      Mint is owned by T-mobile.
      Cricket is owned by AT&T.
      Google Fi uses the T-Mobile network, so it's probably a mtter of time until it gets spun off/sold.

      • Ting Mobile is the up and comer to look at now. They aren't undercutting the carrier-owned "MVNO" networks but they are very competitive. The use both the Verizon and T-Mobile networks (and AT&T soon if not already). They're formerly owned by Tucows, but they're now owned by Dish Wireless (who also owns Boost and Mobile). Dish Wireless got some really nice chunks of spectrum in 2017-2022 and are working on building their own mobile netwrok.

        • by msk ( 6205 )

          It seems to me that you're conflating Ting Mobile and US Mobile.

          • Never heard of US Mobile. But I am a customer of Ting Mobile.

            • by msk ( 6205 )

              I was a Ting Mobile customer for ten years. Since they sold the T-Mobile side of things to Dish, the whole operation has pretty much gone to hell.

              They're not competitive on pricing, their customer service stinks now (it takes a lot to get the Verizon side if you're not a Ting Internet customer), and they still don't support eSIM (for those who need it).

              Their social media staff have apparently evaporated.

              They used to be so good. It's sad.

              Where do you see that they're adding AT&T? That's the piece that le

              • They obviously can't comment on it because their contracts forbid mentioning any carrier they have a deal with by name. But you do see mentions of it around.

                I have to admit, I haven't needed customer service in a while.

      • Yes, they own them, but the prices aren't going up.
    • Given the fact that Mint Wireless was just acquired by T-Mobile....I suspect my family and I will be moving once they jack our rates up as well....

  • by raburton ( 1281780 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @07:03AM (#64493015) Homepage

    It's called inflation, it's even mentioned in the summary. This is not news, and not really tech either. Might as well report every time a unit of electricity goes up.

    • by rykin ( 836525 )
      You joke, but I saw a headline at the end of summer that was blasting our local utility because the rates were jumping in the fall. The article completely ignored the fact that our utility has always had different rates for the summer/winter seasons and this last year wasn't much different than years prior.
      • Are your rates decoupled from supply and demand for electricity as many states explicitly do, by law? In other words, if utilities relied on supply and demand, would they be paying us to take massive oversupply off their hands?

    • by fortfive ( 1582005 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @07:50AM (#64493107)

      Except in the world of technology, mergers, and acquisitions, prices are supposed to go down because economies if scale, elimination of redundancy, efficiency, and innovation and stuff. At least thatâ(TM)s what they saidâ¦.

      • You're right. That's why they're constantly innovating and looking for reasons you might need 6G or 7G. New technology is the only thing that stays expensive.

        And in reality, a proper rollout of 5G requires a lot more fiber infrastructure and more towers. They'll probably end up renaming most of that infrastructure 6G because they won't have done it.

      • Except in the world of technology, mergers, and acquisitions, prices are supposed to go down because economies if scale, elimination of redundancy, efficiency, and innovation and stuff. At least thatâ(TM)s what they saidâ¦.

        You're begging the question. You only need to look at the cost of a mobile plan now vs pre-merger you *are* better off now. Based on inflation alone the average $60/m plan should be $12.93 more expensive. Except they are going up by just $5, most are going up by less than that. In fact on the lower end of their plans over the past 4 years even now that the price increase freeze is lifted the plans will on average have gone up at half the rate of AT&T.

        Now I'm not saying that your point about mergers and

      • "Except in the world of technology, mergers, and acquisitions, prices are supposed to go down"

        The new stuff will be cheaper per unit of capacity. The old stuff...well, if you want to keep using it, you'll have to pay for that.

    • This is part of a broader trend where mobile prices stay the same or even go down in Europe where they have more carriers and stricter regulations but in the US it's the opposite where prices are going UP.

      It's because we let T-Mobile & Sprint merger. The point of this article wasn't one price raise from T-Mobile, it's to highlight the effects of market consolidation.
      • T-Mobile didn't even have proper coverage before the merger. Sure, they had major cities and interstates, but there were vast areas of landmass with no coverage.

      • Firstly, you can't compare the general trend of the entire market in Europe with an increase on a few specific old contracts. Secondly, if they haven't had an increase in a decade then their price has come down in real terms, and unless they are increasing by 10 years worth of inflation, they still will be.

  • by stabiesoft ( 733417 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @07:22AM (#64493049) Homepage
    I've got I think nearly a 20 year old plan that will be grandfathered again with price lock. I recall a few years ago chatting with someone in a store while getting a new phone and they said never let anyone talk you into changing plans. Short of T-Mobile get bought, I may take it to the grave. And who knows, maybe put in the will to keep the plan going for a few months and bury the phone with me just in case.
  • why so expensive? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by thoper ( 838719 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @07:57AM (#64493127)
    Why are Northamerican phone plans so expensive? i live in Chile, i get 300 GB+1000 minutes for 13$. if i want to move carrier i can do it on line, in 5 minutes, to any other carrier, and keep my number if i choose to do so. https://www.entel.cl/planes/of... [entel.cl]
    • Why are Northamerican phone plans so expensive?

      As of March 2023, AT&T has 419,000 cell sites in the United States

      That's part of the reason... The sizes of our countries are vastly different...

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by thegarbz ( 1787294 )

        That's part of the reason... The sizes of our countries are vastly different...

        I find this one dimensional thinking amusing. You are right the countries are vastly different. There are 13x as many potential customers in the USA to pay for that infrastructure.

        • I find this one dimensional thinking amusing. You are right the countries are vastly different. There are 13x as many potential customers in the USA to pay for that infrastructure.

          I find it interesting that you aren't accounting for the fact those potential customers are split among multiple companies and every customer expects his/her cell phone to work EVERYWHERE. So all those 4 companies have to build out EVERYWHERE.

          I looked at a map of cell coverage of Argentina and it's pathetic. you guys have vast areas with no coverage.. We have some areas with no coverage, but they are few and far between.

          • I find it interesting that you aren't accounting for the fact those potential customers are split among multiple companies and every customer expects his/her cell phone to work EVERYWHERE. So all those 4 companies have to build out EVERYWHERE.

            You mean just like in every other country? Look your view is daft. There's no functional difference here. Rural coverage is garbage in America, and the urbanisation rate in America is on par with most countries people often complain about comparing to, including Chile, meaning to cost of infrastructure per customer is very similar.

    • Chile is a linear country.
      You basically just need one powerful antenna with 2 lobes for north and south

    • by ugen ( 93902 )

      This is true in many other countries as well. US mobile prices are insanely high, as are prices for home internet and many other things. That's just how US economy works. Consumer goods are relatively cheap (or were, until the recent bout of inflation) but everything else is out of this world expensive.

    • i live in Chile

      I suspect you get paid like someone who lives in Chile too. The average monthly income in Chile is less than half the average monthly income in the USA. I suspect a person working for Entel gets paid a fraction of what someone working for T-Mobile gets. In fact the minimum wage is roughly 5x higher in the USA.

      Supply and demand does actually work both ways. It's a economic student's fantasy that it is a corporate race to the bottom for your dollar. In the end a balance is struck between forgoing more custome

    • by Ichijo ( 607641 )

      Why are Northamerican phone plans so expensive? i live in Chile, i get 300 GB+1000 minutes for 13$.

      It's because the cost of housing in North America is higher and so we have to pay cell company workers more. You can either have a high-paying job or an affordable house [fortune.com] but to have both, you must first battle the speculators [youtube.com] and their political allies, the anti-housing lobby. [youtube.com]

    • The simple reason is fuck you, that's why.

    • "Why are Northamerican phone plans so expensive?"

      What if prices are arbitrary and inflation is a power play?

    • Mainly because people think they are getting "free" phones every year, that actually cost upwards of $1,000.

      IF you are willing to buy your own phone outright, you can easily get a plan for $20 a month, from carriers such as Boost Mobile and Consumer Cellular. Even the big name carriers offer $30 a month plans if you bring your own device.

  • by Virtucon ( 127420 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @08:13AM (#64493175)

    Expose millions to identity theft by exposing their data, and raise rates because your merger didn't go as planned. Such a great business model.

  • by omnichad ( 1198475 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @09:16AM (#64493321) Homepage

    A price increase with no notice. The only way anyone knows about it is a memo to EMPLOYEES. Customers get a surprise increase with no notice and no time to shop around. All I can say is if it happened to me, I'd be dropping them as fast as possible.

    • T-Mobile sent emails to their business customers. I got one. The real question is did the account holders see the one meaningful email among the pile of steaming sales and marketing spam.
  • I've always found starting the cancellation process a great way for a "customer retention specialist" to find you cheaper pricing.... remember, the last thing they want is to not get your money, even if that means discounting service... at least to a point.

    While this usually works, there are times when it won't... and when those times hit you have to commit and go find another provider running a special and save money over there instead. In the last 20 years I've swtiched providers 3 times to save money..

  • Yes, their loyal and long term business customers like me. I have been thinking of revisiting my cell phone expenses.
    This just gives me a good reason and a push to move on after all these years.
  • I personally have just had a pretty annoying experience with T-Mobile.

    They used to support free, low rate, international data roaming in pretty much any country I tried.

    But the last time I was abroad, I found to my shock that I had zero access to wireless data, until I bought an international plan from them...

    Yeah I know that's the way all other phone carriers works, but it sucks that T-Mobile has fallen to their level now - It's certainly eliminated all loyalty and goodwill I had for them, and will probabl

    • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

      Also, the Sprint merger was a disaster. I have poor to zero cell service in areas where I never had trouble under Sprint. At my house, I used to have four bars. Now I have one, or two if I'm lucky. Same thing at work. And even switching to a new cell phone and SIM didn't change that loss of signal strength.

      I think I'm just about done with them. I started on Verizon, moved to AT&T because of the iPhone, moved to Sprint because of terrible signal strength in critical places with AT&T, and now I

  • Can confirm (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MobileTatsu-NJG ( 946591 ) on Thursday May 23, 2024 @02:28PM (#64494127)

    Whereas with that move people had the option to call T-Mobile's support and push back against the change, a source familiar with the company's plans tells CNET that this option won't be available with this new rate hike.

    I can confirm this. I've made many phone calls to them about this and have not received a solution, yet. What pisses me off is not the rate-hike. It's that they said it's coming up on my next bill in a week or two. If they had said: "hey.. we're planning to raise your rate in 90 days" I would have probably said "yeah, cool, thanks for the heads up." They are right that it has been several years, I don't mind giving them a raise. Instead they said: "We haven't raised your bill in 9 years, so we are now." I asked them for a $30 credit, that's 3 months of my price increase. They said no. Really? You waited 9 years, you couldn't wait 3 more months? Welp, fuck them then. My Apple Watch and iPad no longer need a data plan. Pity, those services and rates were pretty good. But I need to reduce my surface area for the next time they decide to hit me with a rate-increase.

    There's another aspect of this debacle that the summary did not cover. T-Mobile recently excluded AutoPay discounts from credit cards. Not debit cards, JUST CREDIT CARDS. So if I want to use a credit card... where I get consumer protections and rewards... my bill magically goes up $20. Their agents describe it differently, they said it's just not going down $20. Or... I can use their 'T-Mobile money service...' Sigh. Fuck that. Do these jokers NOT understand they've been hacked before?

    If you're wondering why this is making me angry, it's as simple as this: Now TMobile is coming out of my bank account, we all know that bank accounts do not get the same protections for shit like fraud that credit cards do. Now I cannot speak for most Americans, but my credit card limits are a good deal higher than the money I have in my account. Part of the reason my AutoPay was put on a credit card was to ENSURE THEY GET PAID ON TIME. So if T-Mobile goes rogue and decides to give themselves a raise, that money is coming out of the same account my rent check is. And apparently they think it is totally fine to just do it and tell me when my billing period is over before I can react.

    I personally have had a company go rogue and start pulling money from my bank account. I'm a former Time Warner customer and their system decided to charge my debit card twice a month instead of once. It took me nearly a month and 5 hours on the phone to get my money back. "Why can't you just treat it as a credit? It's like you're getting free service for a few months!" This is why I will no longer do Autopay with a debit card... except now because T-Mobile fucking arm-twisted it on me.

    I have a question for ya'all out there- What do you think about me switching to something like Boost or one of those other lil cell phone companies that use the same network as T-Mobile? I love the idea of basically making sure they still have to spend their resources on me, but getting a fraction of the money since they have to feed a middle-man that charges less. I only need voice and unlimited data, I'm not bundling mobile devices anymore.

  • Tmobile Go5GNext for 2 lines was 150$ per month, unlimited everything. Now I'm looking on website it's advertised for 180$. 30$ increase per month sucks pretty badly....

    I am on Go5GNext Military for 130$ for 2 lines (vet discount, nice of them).

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