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T-Mobile USA Planning to Offer iPhone and End Subsidies Within 3-4 Months
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this isn't going to fix the overall monthly cost. just be another way to make more cash for themselves. take away subsidies and they don't have to pay that $400 to apple and keep rates the same. it's a win win for them.
Sigh
Public perception is everything. If all the carriers go to this most people will be like "I'm not going to pay $649 for something that cost me $200 two years ago". The big technology cellphone party where everyone updated their device with every new upgrade and iteration that the economy has been helped by for the last few years will be over.
The public perception will entirely depend on TMobile producing some kind of marketing puffery indicating that their monthly bills for subscribers are significantly lower than the other carriers.
If they can't do that and keep the prices the same this isn't a great deal for the average person looking at it on the street.
Public perception is everything. If all the carriers go to this most people will be like "I'm not going to pay $649 for something that cost me $200 two years ago". The big technology cellphone party where everyone updated their device with every new upgrade and iteration that the economy has been helped by for the last few years will be over.
The public perception will entirely depend on TMobile producing some kind of marketing puffery indicating that their monthly bills for subscribers are significantly lower than the other carriers.
If they can't do that and keep the prices the same this isn't a great deal for the average person looking at it on the street.
yeah like my mother-in-law. it took her years to decide on paying the $49 to get an iPhone 4.....no way in hell she's gonna pay $649 to upgrade her phone when it's time.
You can't get consumers used to paying cheap subsidized phones then shock them at $649. Bc they don't understand that's how much the phones really cost.
Even More plus IS the Value plans, which are very popular (I'm on one) and they've had a for a few years.. They cut about $25-30/mo off because you don't get subsidized phones.
What most don't realize is that even though subsidy goes away, the customer is still NOT paying the full price up front. T-Mobile is pushing it as an alternative subsidy.
Meaning, when you go in, they push you to the value plans, then when you start talking phones they tell you it's $150 or $200 down (up front cost) then they tac on $15 or $20 /mo for the phone for 20 months. Sometimes, like over the holidays, they do a $50 or 0 Down and $15 or $20/mo for phone.
In the end it's still a good $20/mo cheeper than Verizon and ATT but you own the phone.
The reasoning is simple. Subsidies get added onto the debt of the phone company. It something that hangs over their heads because they pickup the phones costs.. This way, the phone's cost is completely on the consumer, but they don't have to pay all up front. It goes on their credit with t-mobile as a payment plan.
Win/Win - customer owns the phone/unlocked with cheeper month to month plan and t-mobile looks a lot better on the books. Customer can pay off the phone anytime and no interest on the phone's payment plan and payment is tied into phone bill. Try that with a credit card these days, you really can't and ATT / Verizon offer no incentives / alternative plans when buying your phone outright.
Conditioned? Please.
The correct term is 'stupid'...sorry but it's true.
If coverage is the same and you aren't one of these individuals that HAS to have data at lightning speeds at all times, then you are just throwing your money away on AT&T and Verizon plans.
And if you can afford those monthly plans of $100+, then you sure as heck can afford an upfront payment of $650. But most people are just clueless about saving money over time vs that day.
For me and many others, it's just simple math that we buy upfront and take it to T-Mobile or other paygo carriers to save us $700+ over 2 years easily.
who is to say the plans will be any cheaper with AT&T or Verizon? If people are going to get loans and tack on extra money, why get rid of the subsidy? People don't understand the true cost of cell phones nowadays. My mother-in-law would barely pay $49 to get an iphone 4 and she thinks that's how much they cost. When she wasn't due for an upgrade we offered to sell a 3GS back in the day for $125. she said we were ripping her off basically bc she could get it cheaper at walmart or radioshack for free or $49. she didn't understand the true cost of the phone. I don't see how this will go over well. Here sir, your bill will be $79.99/month and you pay us $649 for the device. people will not be buying iphones anymore like they have been.
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while stupid sure...but it's not like there are tons of options out there man. I've gone back and forth between carriers and done prepaid etc. yes there are cost savings to do prepaid, but there are also headaches as well. We don't have much choice here in the USA. Now if we had tons of choices i would agree with you. You aren't comparing equal services. T-mobile is a joke on iphone, edge data vs. LTE come on.
People don't understand the true cost of phones bc of the subsidy. All they see is iPhone free, $99, or $199. If you told them they'd have to pay $449, $549, or $649 to use the same phone do you think these people will jump at the chance? Who is to say these companies will even discount their service bc of the lack of subsidy.
It's not that simple. A lot of us get our phones using employer-negotiated discounts, and some of us have grandfathered unlimited plans. I'm paying about $60/month (tax included) for an old AT&T plan with unlimited data. While the $70 Unlimited T-Mobile plan sounds good compared to new AT&T plans, I'm better off right now staying with AT&T. Plus, if they will pay $450 toward my next iPhone while T-Mobile won't, why not just take the subsidy?
The thing is it will still be a contract until you fully pay the phone off.
This is why MVNOs are getting more popular. Same service but at half the cost. T-mobile's prepaid is only 35 a month and Straight talk is 45 a month. I honestly do not see why people stick with the big carriers. As soon as my contract runs out I am ditching for one of the sub $50 MVNOs.
bc you don't get the same service. people act like everything is equal here. I've done Red Pocket, H20, and Straight talk....all AT&T MVNO. If you don't sign up for autopay...they all bug the living crap out of you texting, emailing and even calling you several times a month just to renew your minutes. That alone bothered me that i dropped them and went back to postpaid so i wouldn't be bothered. Data speeds are not reliable either. IF it were completely equal then yes it makes sense...
This is good news. I have an iPhone 4 on Page Plus (Verizon MVNO) and the service is just as good as Verizon postpaid. $30 a month for 1200 minutes/3000 texts/250mb data is a pretty good deal. When I was with AT&T I was paying upwards of $70 a month for less than what I get now. I'd rather pay for the phone outright then get screwed on a two year contract.
Only problem with Page Plus is no 4G data yet. I've heard that it's coming soon.
Only problem with Page Plus is no 4G data yet. I've heard that it's coming soon.
So I pay $649 for my new iPhone, and then I pay less per month for my service than I am now...? I can make that work.
Wow... it amazing to me how many people commenting on this thread don't get it. T-Mobile will offer the iPhone for the same price (or slightly less) than AT&T, Verizon and Sprint -- but after two years of paying off the loan for the phone, subscribers bills will drop. (Or people can choose to pay the full cost of the phone upfront and take the lower bill from the start.)
I love this approach, and would gladly switch to it once my two-year iPhone 5 contract with Verizon is up. I don't always need a new phone every two years, and would be happy to pocket the savings for a year or two until my phone either fell apart or the lure of new technology lead me to replace my phone.
So it's interesting that no one has noted that the real loser in this plan is Apple and the other phone makers -- because fewer people will replace their phones at exact two-year intervals. Currently, there is no incentive for US users not to get a new phone as soon as your contract allows. Under the loan-not-subsidy model, there's a roughly $20 per device per month incentive to hold onto your old phone. If my wife and I kept our phones for a third year, we'd save nearly $500. And Apple (and others) will sell fewer phones in the US because we won't all replace our phones every two years.
I love this approach, and would gladly switch to it once my two-year iPhone 5 contract with Verizon is up. I don't always need a new phone every two years, and would be happy to pocket the savings for a year or two until my phone either fell apart or the lure of new technology lead me to replace my phone.
So it's interesting that no one has noted that the real loser in this plan is Apple and the other phone makers -- because fewer people will replace their phones at exact two-year intervals. Currently, there is no incentive for US users not to get a new phone as soon as your contract allows. Under the loan-not-subsidy model, there's a roughly $20 per device per month incentive to hold onto your old phone. If my wife and I kept our phones for a third year, we'd save nearly $500. And Apple (and others) will sell fewer phones in the US because we won't all replace our phones every two years.
Apparently you don't understand how cellphone bills are broken down. You plan include you paying $X to "pay back" the subsidy that the telco paid up front, so you are getting your 0% financing with paying for the phone built in. Now when the contract ends (reason you're in a contract is so the telco gets their subsidy back), I should not have to be paying that built in subsidy price. It should go down $20-30 from current payments. I'm not belittling you or acting like your stupid. I hope that you no become informed and as outraged as most of us are once you understand what your cell phone bill REALLY consists of.
I would rather pay more up front once for the device, be free of any two year contract and have low monthly payments for the service - especially being able to pick a plan with less minutes since I don't use the phone that much. Right now, with ATT, Sprint, Verizon you are looking at $100. a month plans with a new iPhone (with no way to reduce the phone line minutes part). If T-Mobile can bring lower priced plans with less minutes and no contract - I'm in.
Yes, yes we could! He's my deal. I'm going to be moving to T-Mo here soon w/ their "online only" plan that has the 100 min, unlimited text and unlimited data (first 5gb @ 4g speeds
) and here's the kicker... I'm putting together my own simple ios app that uses Twilio for outgoing calls @ a quarter of cent per minute! Of course using my unlimited data for the connection I've been tracking my cell usage and I only use about 200 minutes a month. So any outgoing calls will be using twilio, and incoming will be regular. Outgoing will also be "masked" with my verified number so when I call out using twilio it will show up w/ the same number. You don't need to use twilio for this, there's a few others but twilio had a nice ios sdk. I'll be holding onto my iPhone 4 till the next one comes out and plop down for those delicious 4g speeds!----------
Not necessarily true. Verizons 4g Lte requires a gsm card (at least from my understanding) so they are finally leaving all the old network behind in a sense. I think that's what we'll get with the next version (5s) or after that (6?)... a true "world" phone thanks to 4g lte.
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That's because almost no carrier allows a Bring your own device w/ smartphones, especially the iPhone. Att has a byod but if it's a smartphone, they automatically change your plan. So it's the telco's screwing you and me over... that's why. And that's why straight talk is so cheap.
Notice how rumour mill is discussing cheaper variants of the iphone, which time wise seems sensible to this shift in subsidies. Its always disgusted me the shoel contract thing and expense of phones. The market is getting more honest now. Thanks god for Straight Talk I dont feel like Im getting bull raped everytime I pay my bill now, especially since Ive always made a point of now being on contract with ANY carriers. Kudos to ST and TM for getting with it.
if this is what the future brings, u can be sure that many people that have iphones now will no longer have them in the future. they don't think the true cost of the device is $649. also, this is tmobile you're talking about.....you think AT&T or Verizon is gonna do the same thing? It's just a way to get the liability off of them and make more money.
Regardless if it comes out to the same price or not, when someone sees that $649 they may rethink having a cell phone in general.....at least the iphone.
Their thinking will be, I have to pay $649 to use the device AND pay $100/month?
If AT&T and Verizon would offer lower plan cost with the end of subsidies I would gladly do it and even sign a contract for the lower rate lock in.
I'm up for cheaper plan rates and bringing your own phone. Most of the market will be in shock though...
why would u sign a contract? lol
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yes they will. you can say goodbye to all the mom and pops with iphone bc they got them free. they aint paying $500 for a cell phone.
if signing a contract meant I got a lower rate over non contract price and lock it in damn straight I would sign it.