T-Mobile Will Pay Off Your Current Phone Up to $1,000 If You Switch

[usagora]

i used to be a sales manager for a competing brand and we offered the same premise, except it was meant for financially abled customers, it was somewhat of a bad deal to consumers because they were caught off guard to be honest, the credit is how much they can give you upwards to that amount and not $1,000 as a matter of fact, “Qualifiying unlocked Device” has to meet their requirements to be worth some money and that always meant having a near brand new phone, we always told customers to get it repaired through applecare or Asurion to get the most amount of the trade in, even then *credit* check is a hard one to see how many lines you could do and you would need a perfect phone number, but the threshold is always 3 months to get the credits or gift card with any provider to ensure brand loyalty, ATT, Verizon and Tmobile all want your business but they favor phone numbers from other carriers to meet their monthly quotas.

It’s a shady business but makes their world go around, the trade in part always left people owing more money than they actually owed to be honest and let’s just say some customers never owned their iphones with the forever iphone program sprint used to have….

I'm going by what T-Mobile has actually published here, not whatever your previous company may or may not have done. They say they will pay what you OWE (not what the phone is worth) to your current carrier up to $1000. The idea here is you keep your phone but switch to T-Mobile service (thus their wording - "Keep and Switch"). You're not trading your phone in, so the condition of the phone should be irrelevant to T-Mobile.

 

[Apleeseed84]

I'm going by what T-Mobile has actually published here, not whatever your previous company may or may not have done. They say they will pay what you OWE (not what the phone is worth) to your current carrier up to $1000. The idea here is you keep your phone but switch to T-Mobile service (thus their wording - "Keep and Switch"). You're not trading your phone in, so the condition of the phone should be irrelevant to T-Mobile.

I completely get that, but to be honest, I could have verbatim said everything about the offer word for word and at the end of the day some customers will always call back in and complain about what wasn’t promised Or “explained” for them, I just got triggered by the horrible aspect of cellphone providers that all of a sudden come out whenever you call them asking for a number port. ?

 

[Handsome Bacon]

I've had TMo The Uncarrier carrier from around 2014 or so. It's ok, nothing to write home about. They offer free Netflix but it's like 480p and only comes with family plans, unless that has changed. I don't watch Netflix anyway.

 

[rodriguez256]

Beware of a deal like this. It almost certainly means they're trying to switch you over from a vastly superior network and experience.

I live in south Texas and thankfully my T-Mobile service and experience has been positive for me. I get 5G Ultra Capacity in most of the areas I go to. Went to lunch with my dad and brother who are AT&T customers. We did a speed test, my brother with his iPhone 12 Pro Max and my dad with his iPhone 11 Pro averaged around 60 Mbps, my T-MOBILE iPhone 12 Pro Max got 681 Mbps. Funny enough the one spot my signal isn’t the best is actually in my bedroom but of course since because of Wi-Fi it’s a non issue. I also pay less than I used to on AT&T, I’m glad I switched a few years back. I’m not sure how better or worse Verizon is though, I’ve never had their service.

 

[MacBH928]

how do they make money if they give you $1000 just to switch to their service?

 

[WestonHarvey1]

how do they make money if they give you $1000 just to switch to their service?

They only need to keep most customers a couple of years to break even on that. People don't switch that often so if you can get someone you've probably got them for awhile.

 

[MacBH928]

They only need to keep most customers a couple of years to break even on that. People don't switch that often so if you can get someone you've probably got them for awhile.

yes but the initiall investment is large. $1000 x 1M customers switching = $1Billion

 

[H2SO4]

Yeah, unfortunately wireless providers, like credit card companies, hate people who pay for things outright or pay their bills in full each month. They focus their business development incentives toward people they think they can lock in.

They don't hate them at all that's ridiculous.
They provide a service that suits some and not others.

May as well say that store card companies, car dealerships and mortgage companies hate those clients too. They are providing a service and last time I checked most companies that provide a service charge for it.

 

[WestonHarvey1]

yes but the initiall investment is large. $1000 x 1M customers switching = $1Billion

It is a lot cheaper than investing in capacity and fixing the gaps in their network coverage.

 

[usagora]

They don't hate them at all that's ridiculous.
They provide a service that suits some and not others.

May as well say that store card companies, car dealerships and mortgage companies hate those clients too. They are providing a service and last time I checked most companies that provide a service charge for it.

What they're getting at is that most of these cellular carrier deals involve payment installment plans for devices, so people who want to pay for the entire cost of their phone up front "lose out" on the deal. Of course, that's their own choice, so they really have no room to complain. I see absolutely nothing wrong with interest-free installment plans as long as you budget for it. It's the same amount of money in the end either way.

I do think their word choice of "hate" is extreme hyperbole, though.

 

[H2SO4]

What they're getting at is that most of these cellular carrier deals involve payment installment plans for devices, so people who want to pay for the entire cost of their phone up front "lose out" on the deal. Of course, that's their own choice, so they really have no room to complain. I see absolutely nothing wrong with interest-free installment plans as long as you budget for it. It's the same amount of money in the end either way.

I do think their word choice of "hate" is extreme hyperbole, though.

They do. But that is how their business model has evolved usually in response to market conditions.
I see nothing wrong with plans that are interest free or have reasonable interest applied, remember that if somebody gives you something they usually want something in return and in the case of a business of course that something is money collected in the form of interest.
They have to very likely spend that money in advance, whicch implies that they are then losing out on the interest that money would have earned.