Submission + - Cellular competition: Do I stay or do I go?
zarmanto writes: Many of you will no doubt have already heard that T-Mobile is dropping the prices on their "unlimited" plans, below those of the other three big cellular providers in the United States. I'm presently a Sprint customer, and yesterday I posted a query about competitive price changes in Sprint's "Buzz About Wireless" community forum, to try and stoke the flames of competition just a bit. (No responses there yet — but then, it hasn't even been up for a full twenty-four hours, as of this post.)
I haven't bothered to call Sprint's billing department with my question, because I'm guessing that they haven't yet had a chance to formulate their "official" response to this new development... but at the same time, I'd really like to get some indication of how long it's likely to take for the slashed prices at one major cellular provider to start hurting the other providers enough that they follow suit with their own price cuts. If it's going to take longer than my "break even" window after eating the termination and activation fees (in my case, only about six months) for Sprint to respond, then I could potentially be saving money by switching over to T-Mobile as soon as possible. On the other hand, if Sprint has a knee-jerk reaction and comes out with new prices next month, then I'd most likely be losing money by switching. It's a gamble either way, and I haven't yet decided which road to take.
So what does the Slashdot community think? Are there other Sprint/AT&T/Verizon customers among you mulling over the notion of eating your termination fee in order to jump over to a new, less expensive, T-Mobile plan? How long do you plan on waiting for your own provider to step up to the plate, before deciding one way or the other?
"Should I stay or should I go, now?
Should I stay or should I go, now? ..."
- The Clash
I haven't bothered to call Sprint's billing department with my question, because I'm guessing that they haven't yet had a chance to formulate their "official" response to this new development... but at the same time, I'd really like to get some indication of how long it's likely to take for the slashed prices at one major cellular provider to start hurting the other providers enough that they follow suit with their own price cuts. If it's going to take longer than my "break even" window after eating the termination and activation fees (in my case, only about six months) for Sprint to respond, then I could potentially be saving money by switching over to T-Mobile as soon as possible. On the other hand, if Sprint has a knee-jerk reaction and comes out with new prices next month, then I'd most likely be losing money by switching. It's a gamble either way, and I haven't yet decided which road to take.
So what does the Slashdot community think? Are there other Sprint/AT&T/Verizon customers among you mulling over the notion of eating your termination fee in order to jump over to a new, less expensive, T-Mobile plan? How long do you plan on waiting for your own provider to step up to the plate, before deciding one way or the other?
"Should I stay or should I go, now?
Should I stay or should I go, now?
- The Clash
