You gotta spend money to make money?

/got nuthin

When your business model is to sell a $600 phone for $200, but then earn roughly $35/mo for two+ years, new customers mean big upfront losses but better lifetime profits.

It costs a LOT of money to make a new customer, but you make up for it by making sure they pay you money back for your services. This is a pretty well understood business practice.

So selling at a loss and making it up with volume doesn't really work?

Question: does this mean that they'll try and change the rules to their Virgin & Boost Mobile PAY-Go services? I'm paying $25 a month right now for unlimited texts, email, web, & data + 300 minutes (which I only come close to using if mom calls), and I feel like that's a pretty sweet deal. They notified me that they were going to be putting a data cap on at 2.5 GB starting in March, but the easy way around that is to use wi-fi whenever possible. I'm hoping the potential losses from these services is outweighed by the iPhone issue described by thomps allows me to keep using as I've been for the past year.

madden101: Virgin ... going to be putting a data cap on at 2.5 GB starting in March

FYI the cap means they will throttle any data over 2.5 GB to 256kbps.

Just ran speedtest on my Vrigin Motorola Triumph: 460 kbps down / 625 up on 3G

I probably wouldn't even notice throttling to 256, though. Not that I use anywhere near that much data.

I find Sprint to be the best of the big 3, but the lack of iPhone had held it back from a consumer perception standpoint. It would be very interesting to see how Sprint does in 2012.

Anyone know what the drop dead date for Nextel is? Hoping they will offer some sweet deals to us Nextel folk, when it happens.

GradStudentForLife: FYI the cap means they will throttle any data over 2.5 GB to 256kbps.

Throttling, if the policy is clearly explained, seems like the answer to me. I'll live on 256k just fine. It's enough to stream basic internet radio. It's adequate for stuff like Opera Mini. It's adequate for getting my e-mail. It's adequate for getting SSH back to work. If it's not, I'll buy a bump-up.

I'd avoided Virgin/Sprint up to the present since, until recently, I had to travel a lot in rural America. And Sprint without the Verizon partner map totally sucks for that. Now, I really don't expect to be in the deep sticks very often. Even where the prepaid doesn't reach, you can still get 911 on whatever CDMA network is running.

The Banana Thug: I find Sprint to be the best of the big 3, but the lack of iPhone had held it back from a consumer perception standpoint. It would be very interesting to see how Sprint does in 2012.

If Sprint would add coverage to SW Wisconsin, I'd be happy to switch to them (or Virgin) but as it is they aren't a possible carrier for me. The whole iPhone thing has never even been a consideration from my perspective - its the lack of reliable coverage in areas where I need it. Verizon and US Cellular are pretty much the only options I have.

I worked for Sprint LT as a contractor for 11 months of Hell back in '97-'98. A more fscked up place I cannot imagine. Nothing they do surprises me. We had 50% turnover in my area of 12 months. Nothing was ever explained, you had to go and bug people to tell you how to do stuff, even stuff they ordered you to do. I don't mean hand-holding here, I mean basic crap like the fact that they wanted documentation and the format they wanted it in. And you had to have a meeting and documents for EVERYTHING, no matter how minor. My boss made female workers cry. I got canned while taking a few days off so my wife could have little JammerJim (to be fair, I was a bad fit there and didn't do a great job -- but fired while your wife was in labor? Really?). AND they used Lotus Notes.

/CSB
/I might be bitter
/I suppose they might have improved since then

From my experience, Sprint is the best of the big 3. My experience with Verizon was probably the worst I've ever had with any company for both support and trying to just get a working signal on their network. AT&T really appears to try, but I think the issue is their network is so large they really have trouble controlling all the moving parts of their environment. Sprint right now is in that happy place where I usually don't have signal issues anywhere I go, and their customer support is still good. Give it a few years and they'll probably change for the worse.

Dr J Zoidberg: Dr J Zoidberg: Anyone here have sprint and do they throttle data?

I ask because I am leaving Verizon. I would rather eat a gun than go to AT&T, and T-Mobile doesn't serve my area. So it's between Sprint and US Cellular, who claims to be coming out with an LTE network in March

I work at sprint, they have unlimited data for smartphones. They will kick you off if you go over like 15gb of use on your phone though, but it takes a lot to actually have them terminate your contract for excessive data use on your cell since its considered free. No, they don't throttle, yet. But you have a snowballs chance in hell of getting any credit, and activation/upgrade fees are always valid now too. Nice to find out from tfa why.

Dr J Zoidberg: Anyone here have sprint and do they throttle data?

No. Not yet. They might be in some higher cases (it can be hard to tell it from 'network's being slow'), but not officially.

However, they appear to have put the screws to their biggest prepaid virtual operator (Virgin Mobile), who will be running a formal throttling system starting next month. I think you have to consider it a test. If they don't have a major user exodus (and remember, no termination fees with Virgin... just eating the cost of the phone) but notable traffic benefits ('self-deporting' of a few high-bandwidth users), it might come to Sprint mainline quite soon afterwards. Or, Sprint could use the throttling to better distinguish their branded product over their virtual-operators.

madden101: Question: does this mean that they'll try and change the rules to their Virgin & Boost Mobile PAY-Go services? I'm paying $25 a month right now for unlimited texts, email, web, & data + 300 minutes (which I only come close to using if mom calls), and I feel like that's a pretty sweet deal. .

$25 for 2.5 GB plus 300 minutes would start riots in my third world country.

/Canada

I bailed from AT&T during the merger talk (which I was sure was going to happen) last October. Got my first smartphone, and I don't have to worry about caps/throttling (yet).

If they do mess with my data, I'll hold out hope for an LTE network soon, just to avoid going back to AT&T.

// also, the Galaxy S I (Epic 4g touch) freezes every 36 hours or so

JammerJim: I worked for Sprint LT as a contractor for 11 months of Hell back in '97-'98. A more fscked up place I cannot imagine. Nothing they do surprises me. We had 50% turnover in my area of 12 months. Nothing was ever explained, you had to go and bug people to tell you how to do stuff, even stuff they ordered you to do. I don't mean hand-holding here, I mean basic crap like the fact that they wanted documentation and the format they wanted it in. And you had to have a meeting and documents for EVERYTHING, no matter how minor. My boss made female workers cry. I got canned while taking a few days off so my wife could have little JammerJim (to be fair, I was a bad fit there and didn't do a great job -- but fired while your wife was in labor? Really?). AND they used Lotus Notes.

OHHH MYY GOD!!

Well I paid them $180 for a free 2 week trial...

Dr Dreidel: I bailed from AT&T during the merger talk (which I was sure was going to happen) last October. Got my first smartphone, and I don't have to worry about caps/throttling (yet).

If they do mess with my data, I'll hold out hope for an LTE network soon, just to avoid going back to AT&T.

// also, the Galaxy S I (Epic 4g touch) freezes every 36 hours or so

Sprint is rolling out LTE in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio this year.
Sprint does not cap or throttle (that's their explicit selling point), though who's to say they don't change their policy somewhere down the line, especially as they get more and more iphone users.
I've never had a problem with my Epic. (that's the one with the sliding keyboard, which is a Galaxy S I phone). If you're talking about the Epic 4G Touch (no keyboard), that's a Galaxy S II phone.

/Sprint customer since '05. Had major billing/CS issues with them before, but they've improved -a lot-.
//lives right outside their WiMax range in Atlanta so the 4G option on my phone is useless at home

I like Sprint, though I'm still riding the SERO plan I got years ago. When making the switch from AT&T, the trial was great- I got a new phone and a temporary number which I tried out for a while, then once I decided I liked it, I gave AT&T the boot and they gave my new phone my old line. I've never really had a hard time with them. They even gave me a free femtocell when my new house didn't get very good reception. I have stopped using it since the network in my area has improved, so I am a generally satisfied customer.

Wow, that truly sounds like an awful business model.

1.Current Sprint customer but am getting WAYYYYYYYY overcharged for their Family Share plan (especially offensive is the $10/month Smartphone fee) - our monthly bill is $190 for two lines, which includes unlimited mobile-to-mobile, unlimited text, unlimited data and 1600 Anytime minutes.

My contract's up in July and am looking to switch to someone with unlimited text and 1000 minutes (shared) - don't really care too much about data plans. Any recommendations?

fat_free: 1.Current Sprint customer but am getting WAYYYYYYYY overcharged for their Family Share plan (especially offensive is the $10/month Smartphone fee) - our monthly bill is $190 for two lines, which includes unlimited mobile-to-mobile, unlimited text, unlimited data and 1600 Anytime minutes.

My contract's up in July and am looking to switch to someone with unlimited text and 1000 minutes (shared) - don't really care too much about data plans. Any recommendations?

I'm in the same boat. I've been with Sprint for... 9 years or so. I have a shared plan (crappy plan from 5 years ago) for my wife and I, no smart phones. I thought it would be easy to get a couple new IPhones and the basic 2 line data plans. I was fairly incorrect. I was okay with the $10 a month fee per phone, plus the new rate... but I was not okay with the $36 (per line) activation fee they wanted to charge me. But sir, it is industry standard. I said I've been with Sprint for 9 years and have never paid any such thing... to which the customer service rep replied "well, we have customers that have been with us for 12 or more years." Okay, I guess. I have been shopping for a new carrier... but no one really seems to be any better... or even cheaper. I'll stick with my crappy $99 a month plan for 2 lines... that costs $130 a month for some reason.

One thing I like about sprint is that some work places, banks, credit unions, etc. have discounts. I get 22% and it off sets the bill to cover taxes.

The thing I learned with Sprint is to always check my bill if I make changes to my account. This is my biggest complaint with Sprint. Every time I have to make any changes they screw it up. I got new phones last summer online. It was supposed to be free phone, activation and shipping. I called customer service to let them know I ordered the phones and to make sure things went smoothly with the transition from old to new phones. Then I received the bill. I was charged for the activation and shipping. Plus a data charge. I ended up resolving the activation and shipping and got $100 credit toward my next bill from Sprint. Then I ordered the data plan for both phones to knock out the data charges. Next bill, next bill only one phone had data plan activated. I corrected that. Later, I found out I could save some money by signing up with everything plan and switched it as to the first of a month. Had to call them back again because the customer service person entered the everything family plan on one phone and a single everything data on the other. I resolved it and not having problems with billing so far (Knocks on wood.)

karmaceutical: but I was not okay with the $36 (per line) activation fee they wanted to charge me.

You can avoid the activation fee by buying from Sprint's online store. If you don't want to do that, you can call them up and ask them to waive it. I bought my phone from a local store, and the salesman told me to call up and ask them to waive it. They didn't even put up a fight. It was just, "Can I get that waived?' "Sure, just a moment." My girlfriend had to tell them she was "disappointed" before they'd waive it for her, though.

If I promise not to become a Sprint customer, can they just pay me $500, which will still put them ahead, relatively speaking.

I had a pretty cheap plan and had a promotional "500 texts for $1/mo" deal that I hated to give up, but Sprint had pretty crappy coverage at my new place. Alas.
(No browsing/smartphoning/etc....just calls and texts...)

I switched to Sprint after T-Mo wouldn't waive an 18 dollar upgrade fee for my new 200 dollar phone that they were giving away free to new customers. After I'd been a T-mo customer for 10 years.

meh - I pay $136 for the family plan (2 lines), unlimited data, texting, minutes, etc... plus an airrave to improve my service at my house. I think i have an 18% discount from working somewhere 8 years ago. I price check every once in a while when my contract is up, and have never been able to find anyone who can touch it rate-wise.

madden101: I'm paying $25 a month right now for unlimited texts, email, web, & data + 300 minutes (which I only come close to using if mom calls), and I feel like that's a pretty sweet deal. They notified me that they were going to be putting a data cap on at 2.5 GB starting in March, but the easy way around that is to use wi-fi whenever possible.

Hurray for Virgin Mobile. Most peoples jaws drop when I explain what I pay. I just wish they had a way to log in and SEE how much data I've used a month.

darkscout: Hurray for Virgin Mobile. Most peoples jaws drop when I explain what I pay. I just wish they had a way to log in and SEE how much data I've used a month.

I'm wondering if they'll add that feature when the start to throttle. Either way, I enjoy rubbing my siblings-in-law's noses in it whenever they start talking about their AT&T iPhones. We pay $50 total a month for 2 lines, 300 minutes each, and unlimited everything else. Sure, we don't have iPhones, but I'm not that torn up about it (considering the phones we replaced were Samsung flip phones with no cameras, and we paid $70 a month for 700 shared minutes but no text, data, web, etc.), because they pay well north of $100 a month for 2 lines of cell phone/data service.