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Cellular Phone Forum / Providers / ATT Wireless / February 2008How many users actually benefit from $99 unlimited?
For the cost of one of those $99 unlimited plans (which will be about $115 after taxes and fees), you could buy about 2150 minutes on a prepaid network (at about 5.3¢ per minute). That's about 35 hours a month. Other than certain business people, i.e. realtors, field service, etc., how many users actually use over 2000 minutes per month? PagePlus charges as low as 5.3¢/minute for voice, and as low as 3.5¢ per text message (when you buy the $80 "1400 minute" card at a discounted price of $74). They also offer unlimited voice minutes for $2.49 a day, or $75 for a 30 day month. It seems that too many consumers look at the "unlimited" part, without understanding that $99 is a) not really $99, and b) not such a great deal compared to non-unlimited plans, and c) a lot more than they have to pay for unlimited voice. Great post. You are 1000% correct. I don't even need the 1000 minutes I get from T-mobile, but I'm only paying $39.99 & that includes free nights & weekends. > For the cost of one of those $99 unlimited plans (which will be about $115 > after taxes and fees), you could buy about 2150 minutes on a prepaid [quoted text clipped - 11 lines] > compared to non-unlimited plans, and c) a lot more than they have to pay > for unlimited voice. > Great post. You are 1000% correct. I don't even need the 1000 minutes I get > from T-mobile, but I'm only paying $39.99 & that includes free nights & > weekends. Yes, T-Mobile is a great deal for a lot of peak minutes. Unfortunately they have no coverage yet where I live, and poor coverage where I usually travel to. I pay $30 for 300 minutes and unlimited N&W on Verizon, and I just don't get into long gab fests during peak times. In my job, I go as far west on the Pa. turnpike to Harrisburg, Pa., on the NJ turnpike I go as far north to Fort Lee, NJ. I have no problems with T-mobile. >> Great post. You are 1000% correct. I don't even need the 1000 minutes I >> get from T-mobile, but I'm only paying $39.99 & that includes free nights [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > I pay $30 for 300 minutes and unlimited N&W on Verizon, and I just don't > get into long gab fests during peak times. > In my job, I go as far west on the Pa. turnpike to Harrisburg, Pa., on the > NJ turnpike I go as far north to Fort Lee, NJ. I have no problems with > T-mobile. Yes, T-Mobile seems to work very well in the eastern U.S.. My mother switched to T-Mobile prepaid in Florida after AT&T/Cingular converted her from TDMA/AMPS to GSM and increased the monthly rate by 40%. She started a movement among her senior friends when they found out how little she was paying. However now she uses OneSuite for long distance at 2.5¢/minute, where before she could use free N&W on AT&T. In the western U.S., T-Mobile took over the horrid Cingular/Pac Bell 1900 MHz GSM network, which has poor coverage. They've been trying to improve things, but have run into a lot of opposition to suburban cell sites. Still, it's slowly improving. Sometime in 2008 I should get coverage at my house, but there are still a lot of areas of the Bay Area with coverage holes, much more than with Verizon or AT&T. >In the western U.S., T-Mobile took over the horrid Cingular/Pac Bell >1900 MHz GSM network, which has poor coverage. They've been trying to >improve things, but have run into a lot of opposition to suburban cell >sites. Still, it's slowly improving. Sometime in 2008 I should get >coverage at my house, but there are still a lot of areas of the Bay Area >with coverage holes, much more than with Verizon or AT&T. Nonsense. The old Cingular now T-Mobile actually has good coverage. Will you stop the trolling when you finally get coverage in your house? Or must your wife get coverage at work too? ;)  SignatureBest regards, John Navas <http:/navasgroup.com> "Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea - massive, difficult to redirect, awe inspiring, entertaining, and a source of mind boggling amounts of excrement when you least expect it." --Gene Spafford >> In my job, I go as far west on the Pa. turnpike to Harrisburg, Pa., on >> the NJ turnpike I go as far north to Fort Lee, NJ. I have no problems [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > little she was paying. However now she uses OneSuite for long distance > at 2.5¢/minute, where before she could use free N&W on AT&T. That would be except in the large region of the eastern US that I am in. A tmobile phone is a paperweight here if you go a few miles away from the interstate. > In the western U.S., T-Mobile took over the horrid Cingular/Pac Bell > 1900 MHz GSM network, which has poor coverage. They've been trying to > improve things, but have run into a lot of opposition to suburban cell > sites. Still, it's slowly improving. Sometime in 2008 I should get > coverage at my house, but there are still a lot of areas of the Bay Area > with coverage holes, much more than with Verizon or AT&T. > That would be except in the large region of the eastern US that I am in. > A tmobile phone is a paperweight here if you go a few miles away from > the interstate. Yeah, but apparently that model fits quite a few users. I remember commenting once about how one carrier had coverage throughout the Sierra Nevada mountains, by virtue of both their native network and roaming, including coverage on several state roads over mountain passes with ski resorts. A competing carrier lacked coverage in these areas. One response was along the lines of planning your routes so you avoid routes where your carrier has coverage issues! It's true, if you stay on Interstate 80, you have pretty much uninterrupted coverage on any carrier, at least with roaming. It's amazing to me how many people live their lives without ever venturing more than a few miles from their homes. Unfortunately we're seeing repercussions of this now in California, where one of the budget cutting moves is to close down 48 state parks. There's not much of a constituency to keep them open since they are little used. > In my job, I go as far west on the Pa. turnpike to Harrisburg, Pa., on the > NJ turnpike I go as far north to Fort Lee, NJ. I have no problems with [quoted text clipped - 9 lines] >> I pay $30 for 300 minutes and unlimited N&W on Verizon, and I just don't >> get into long gab fests during peak times. Can I suggest that isn't much of a test? I think every carrier has the PA & Jersey pike lit up. > Can I suggest that isn't much of a test? I think every carrier has the PA > & Jersey pike lit up. True, but in many ways, that's sort of the point. I'll be the first to admit that my T-Mo phone doesn't work "everywhere." But it works where I am 99% of the time. Since I pay T-Mo $72/month for what would cost me $150 on Verizon, the real question, for me, is what is that last 1% worth to me in terms of cost? (And the answer to that, apparently, is "$2.50/month" since I activated an eBay phone on PagePlus as a glovebox backup just in case! So far I've used 0 minutes on it since activating it in November.) >> Can I suggest that isn't much of a test? I think every carrier has the >> PA & Jersey pike lit up. [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > backup just in case! So far I've used 0 minutes on it since activating > it in November.) I need my phone to work when I am out so it isn't worth it to me. There are just too many places where tmobile lacks coverage as soon as you leave the core city area or go away from the highway. > I need my phone to work when I am out so it isn't worth it to me. There > are just too many places where tmobile lacks coverage as soon as > you leave the core city area or go away from the highway. That certainly may be true in your area, but it also could be that you just may not be aware of the improvements made in their coverage over the last two years or so (mostly through roaming agreements.) Rural coverage in particular has been greatly improved. Some carriers, even small CDMA carriers (like Alltel in some areas) actually operate small GSM system overlays just to skim roaming revenues from AT&T and T-Mobile. While I'd never suggest T-Mo's Coverage is anywhere near as extensive as Verizon's, they've come a Very long way since I first used them in 2001. (Back then I used them for their 3000 minutes/$49 regional plan as a business phone, and kept a seperate Cingular TDMA/AMPS phone as my personal phone, which doubled as a much-needed backup for T-Mo's piss-poor coverage at that time.) I still keep a backup phone (prepaid, these days) for T-Mo to this day, mostly out of habit, but rarely need it. In fact I went without a backup for most of 2007, since Beyond Wireless TDMA shut down last March, and I didn't activate a phone on PagePlus until Thanksgiving (still unused despite a lot of travel to various Colorado ski areas this winter.) You might be surprised at how much they've improved. Don't let preconcieved (but correct!) notions of how crummy their coverage was several years ago cloud your opinions. >> Great post. You are 1000% correct. I don't even need the 1000 >> minutes I get from T-mobile, but I'm only paying $39.99 & that [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > they have no coverage yet where I live, and poor coverage where I > usually travel to. If they had better coverage, they wouldn't be only $40! There's a point there somewhere that some seem to miss. Maybe it's me. Sorry. > > Yes, T-Mobile is a great deal for a lot of peak minutes. Unfortunately > > they have no coverage yet where I live, and poor coverage where I > > usually travel to. > > > If they had better coverage, they wouldn't be only $40! There's a point > there somewhere that some seem to miss. Maybe it's me. Sorry. Or maybe believing that is how Verizon's and AT&T's customers get to sleep at night! ;-) >>> Yes, T-Mobile is a great deal for a lot of peak minutes. Unfortunately >>> they have no coverage yet where I live, and poor coverage where I [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > Or maybe believing that is how Verizon's and AT&T's customers get to sleep > at night! ;-) Yes, that's how I am able to sleep. Seriously though, I have two GSM phones without 800 MHz, my original Cingular GSM phone from when Cingular out west was only 1900 MHz, and my tri-mode "traveling phone" which is 900/1800/1900. If I put my SIM card into one of those phones, which limits me to roaming on the T-Mobile network with SpeakOut (an AT&T MVNO), the loss of coverage is very noticeable (starting with no coverage where I live, unless I go outside and down the street a bit). The big problem with T-Mo, is that they won't let you roam onto AT&T in areas where they have a network. According to some Sprint users, if you set your handset to roaming only then Sprint does allow roaming onto Verizon even in areas where Sprint has a network. > > Or maybe believing that is how Verizon's and AT&T's customers get to sleep > > at night! ;-) [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > Cingular GSM phone from when Cingular out west was only 1900 MHz, > and my tri-mode "traveling phone" which is 900/1800/1900. In this day and age, however, not using a GSM cellphone with 850 doesn't really give you the right to complain about crummy GSM service that you claim to "test" on a regular basis. Particularly in light of your statements about places you've been with "only analog or CDMA and no GSM coverage..." Without GSM 850, (which is what AT&T's analog footprint has converted to) those statements are VERY suspect. > If I put my SIM card into one of those phones, which limits me to > roaming on the T-Mobile network with SpeakOut (an AT&T MVNO), the > loss of coverage is very noticeable (starting with no coverage where > I live, unless I go outside and down the street a bit). Fair enough. I've already acknowledged T-Mo doesn't have as extensive a network as Verizon, and if it didn't work where I lived I wouldn't use them either. However, as I've pointed out before, when I moved to my current house, I was in the opposite, and admittedly _very_ rare situation- neither Verizon nor AT&T had no coverage here yet Sprint and T-Mo did! (Four years later, they all have coverage now.) > The big problem with T-Mo, is that they won't let you roam onto AT&T > in areas where they have a network. That's a problem with most carriers- Verizon doesn't let you roam if they have coverage in the area either, though admittedly that "problem" will happen less often than with T-Mo! ;-) > According to some Sprint users, if you set your handset to roaming > only then Sprint does allow roaming onto Verizon even in areas where > Sprint has a network. Neat feature, but I've never tried Sprint so I can't confirm or deny. > In this day and age, however, not using a GSM cellphone with 850 doesn't > really give you the right to complain about crummy GSM service that you > claim to "test" on a regular basis. Particularly in light of your > statements about places you've been with "only analog or CDMA and no GSM > coverage..." Without GSM 850, (which is what AT&T's analog footprint has > converted to) those statements are VERY suspect. Yes, I use a very good 850/1900 Motorola model handset for GSM testing on AT&T Wireless, I just tried the SIM in the 1900 MHz models because I wanted to see if T-Mobile had added coverage to my area. > That's a problem with most carriers- Verizon doesn't let you roam if they > have coverage in the area either, though admittedly that "problem" will > happen less often than with T-Mo! ;-) There was one building at a company I worked at where I was constantly roaming onto Sprint in one specific conference room. This was several years ago, but apparently there are or were PRLs where Sprint roaming was permitted even in Verizon markets. > Neat feature, but I've never tried Sprint so I can't confirm or deny. Someday I'll find a Sprint subscriber in my area and be able to confirm or deny this, but I've not yet met one. Everyone I know uses either AT&T or Verizon (or T-Mobile prepaid). I do know one Sprint subscriber in Florida and one in L.A., so maybe the next time I see them I'll try it. The Sprint coverage in most of California is nearly as bad as T-Mobile's coverage. > Yes, I use a very good 850/1900 Motorola model handset for GSM > testing on AT&T Wireless, I just tried the SIM in the 1900 MHz models > because I wanted to see if T-Mobile had added coverage to my area. Are you sure SpeakOut still roams on T-Mo in your area? I think the network transition is over (or darn near.) The network IDs were recently changed, IIRC. Can't you just do a network search and see who comes up? Or does Cingular lock that menu out? (Although last year when I was in the Bay Area a network search on my T-Mo phone and SIM showed "Cingular" and "Cingular") ;-) >> Yes, I use a very good 850/1900 Motorola model handset for GSM >> testing on AT&T Wireless, I just tried the SIM in the 1900 MHz models [quoted text clipped - 9 lines] > (Although last year when I was in the Bay Area a network search on my T-Mo > phone and SIM showed "Cingular" and "Cingular") ;-) Last year the MCC-MNC for AT&T and T-Mobile were 310-380 and 310-170, respectively, which a lot of phones of a certain vintage might call "Cingular" and "Cingular". This year they are now 310-410 and 310-260, which most phones will get right, though with my AT&T SIM in my phone they show up as "AT&T" and "AT&T". I don't quite know the reason for that, though I assume it has something to do with AT&T using T-Mobile for roaming in other parts of the country. Dennis Ferguson > Someday I'll find a Sprint subscriber in my area and be able to confirm or > deny this, but I've not yet met one. Everyone I know uses either AT&T or > Verizon (or T-Mobile prepaid). I do know one Sprint subscriber in Florida > and one in L.A., so maybe the next time I see them I'll try it. The Sprint > coverage in most of California is nearly as bad as T-Mobile's coverage. You are very uninformed and are probably operating from out-of-date facts or are simply repeating something that you read or something that one of your buddies said while in a bar. Sprint coverage in Southern California is as good or better than Verizon. Sprint will also allow you to force your digital Sprint Phone to Roaming Only mode anytime that you desire. This gives you the best of Verizon and Sprint together anytime that you want to use this capability. Therefore, Sprint is better than Verizon because it is the only cell phone service that offers this option. I have the best of Verizon and Sprint in one phone on a low cost plan. >> According to some Sprint users, if you set your handset to roaming >> only then Sprint does allow roaming onto Verizon even in areas where >> Sprint has a network. > > Neat feature, but I've never tried Sprint so I can't confirm or deny. This feature is included on all Sprint "digital only" phones that have been released in the past several years. >>>> Yes, T-Mobile is a great deal for a lot of peak minutes. Unfortunately >>>> they have no coverage yet where I live, and poor coverage where I [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] > tri-mode "traveling phone" which is 900/1800/1900. If I put my SIM card > into one of those phones, which limits me to roaming on the T-Mobile Why would you be limited to T-Mobile? AT&T has 1900 MHz coverage in the bay area. I get it when I put my AT&T SIM in a phone which lacks 850 MHz, though the coverage is abysmal for reasons that aren't clear to me. > network with SpeakOut (an AT&T MVNO), the loss of coverage is very > noticeable (starting with no coverage where I live, unless I go outside > and down the street a bit). The funny thing is, the last time I tried a SpeakOut SIM in my phone I couldn't even force it to use T-Mobile's network in the bay area (I can't force my AT&T SIM to use T-Mobile's network either); I got registration failures. If you are evaluating T-Mobile's coverage using a SpeakOut SIM either you have a much better SpeakOut SIM than I had, or you may be evaluating AT&T's 1900 MHz service instead. That latter is indeed poor. Dennis Ferguson > For the cost of one of those $99 unlimited plans (which will be about > $115 after taxes and fees), you could buy about 2150 minutes on a [quoted text clipped - 11 lines] > deal compared to non-unlimited plans, and c) a lot more than they have > to pay for unlimited voice. I think that with a low enough price point that unlimited becomes useful for those who want to drop a landline and go all cellular all the time. Unfortuantely I think that getting Magic Jack is a bigger bang for the buck in dropping a old fashioned landline then trying to cut the cord using a cell phone plan. You can't beat unlimited calling in the US and Canada 24 X 7 for only $20 a year. Plus you get all those advanced phone services thrown in for free also . Magic Jack is one kick a.s phone company when it comes to net cost! Now if AT&T could drop the cell bill to only $20 a year that would be something. >> For the cost of one of those $99 unlimited plans (which will be about >> $115 after taxes and fees), you could buy about 2150 minutes on a [quoted text clipped - 25 lines] > Now if AT&T could drop the cell bill to only $20 a year that would be > something. But magicjack doesn't have a sustainable business plan. Also there is a huge difference between a wireless carrier who has to have a massive infrastructure compared to a VoIP provider who needs some equipment in one location. > I think that with a low enough price point that unlimited becomes > useful for those who want to drop a landline and go all cellular all [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > US and Canada 24 X 7 for only $20 a year. Plus you get all those > advanced phone services thrown in for free also . Magic Jack is an interesting option, but it's probably doomed. The "$20/year" is a money losing proposition for them- they don't own their phone numbers, so thy have "rent" them from a provider like Level 3 for maybe $3 or even more depending on the amount of incoming calls. Then they have to pay termination fees of $0.01-0.05/minute (depending on where you call.) Magic Jack is hoping to make it up on sales of banner advertising you'll see on the softphone display, which may or may not cover their costs. > Magic Jack is one kick a.s phone company when it comes to net cost! Sure. Anytime you give a product away, consumers will be happy! Magic Jack will be a heck of a bargain... ...until the VC money runs out! ;-) > Now if AT&T could drop the cell bill to only $20 a year that would be > something. Maybe after they start running 30-second commercials on your iPhone display before and after each call they will! > I think that with a low enough price point that unlimited becomes > useful for those who want to drop a landline and go all cellular all > the time. Yeah, unless: a) you want to have DSL, in which case you may as well get a landline anyway since the price difference between naked DSL and DSL plus a landline is minimal, and b) you have kids or seniors that need the 911 service of a landline. Also, in natural disasters, often the wireless networks are overloaded or go down, but landlines still work. During the bad hurricane season a few years ago, we also saw that a lot of wireless sites had no back-up generator, only batteries, so they went down pretty quickly. Cingular had 25% of their sites with generators (according to their own press release), while Verizon had 80% with back up power (Verizon claims to have a generator at every site where they are allowed to have one). Cingular's goal is to have enough sites up to provide complete coverage, but to sacrifice capacity, "We will sacrifice the capacity piece to try to attain blanket coverage as much as possible." "http://telephonyonline.com/mag/telecom_signal_end_storm/" "http://news.vzw.com/news/2006/03/pr2006-04-04a.html" > Magic Jack is one kick a.s phone company when it comes to net cost! > Now if AT&T could drop the cell bill to only $20 a year that would be > something. How long do you think Magic Jack is going to survive at $20/year? It's great while it lasts though. They'll probably be going the way of SunRocket before long. > Also, in natural disasters, often the wireless networks are overloaded > or go down, but landlines still work. Actually, just the opposite is true. Granted, as usual you showed an exception to the rule in order to pass it along as the rule. However, during most natural disasters it's the landlines that go down first. >> Also, in natural disasters, often the wireless networks are overloaded >> or go down, but landlines still work. > > Actually, just the opposite is true. Granted, as usual you showed an > exception to the rule in order to pass it along as the rule. However, > during most natural disasters it's the landlines that go down first. Don't cell phones eventually connect via landlines? It seems to me that it's cell phone to tower by air, tower to central office by wire, Central office to central office by wire, central office to tower by wire and tower to cell by air. For wire, you may substitute fiber optics, if the local phone company is REALLY up-to-date. >>> Also, in natural disasters, often the wireless networks are overloaded >>> or go down, but landlines still work. [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] > wire and tower to cell by air. For wire, you may substitute fiber > optics, if the local phone company is REALLY up-to-date. Yes, this is why landlines are usually more reliable in the event of a natural disaster (unless of course the wire to your house is knocked down). >>> Also, in natural disasters, often the wireless networks are overloaded >>> or go down, but landlines still work. [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] > wire and tower to cell by air. For wire, you may substitute fiber > optics, if the local phone company is REALLY up-to-date. Rural sites (like the one I just posted links to pictures of) used microwave to connect to another cell site or to the main switch's tower with all kinds of microwave dishes on it. Think of the days of AT&T running Radio Relay, from the mid-'50s to the mid-'90s. with all those feed horns and L-2 and L-3 circuits passing phone calls and televison network feeds. SignatureCurtis R. Anderson, Co-creator of "Gleepy the Hen", still Email not munged, SpamAssassin [tm] in effect. http://www.gleepy.net/ mailto:gleepy@intelligencia.com mailto:gleepy@gleepy.net (and others) Yahoo!: gleepythehen >> I think that with a low enough price point that unlimited becomes >> useful for those who want to drop a landline and go all cellular all [quoted text clipped - 18 lines] > "http://telephonyonline.com/mag/telecom_signal_end_storm/" > "http://news.vzw.com/news/2006/03/pr2006-04-04a.html" I bet many people don't realize how Mickey Mouse some carriers are. Tmobile doesn't believe in generators and at least in my area the old AT&T TDMA/analog sites had generators but now the GSM stuff just has battery. > I bet many people don't realize how Mickey Mouse some carriers are. > Tmobile doesn't believe in generators and at least in my area the old > AT&T TDMA/analog sites had generators but now the GSM stuff just has > battery. Verizon claims to have generators at every site where generators are permitted (80%). AT&T claims to have generators at enough sites to provide complete geographic coverage, but at reduced capacity. This may be why Verizon tends to do better in blackouts and other disasters where power is interrupted. I couldn't find any information on Sprint and T-Mobile's back-up power infrastructure, other than Sprint's press release of installing generators at some sites in Florida and Texas. Just looking at some of the strange places that Sprint and T-Mobile have had to install sites in order to get complete coverage, where generators aren't allowed, there is just no way they could equal the AT&T and Verizon coverage in a prolonged blackout. >> I bet many people don't realize how Mickey Mouse some carriers are. >> Tmobile doesn't believe in generators and at least in my area the old [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > is just no way they could equal the AT&T and Verizon coverage in a > prolonged blackout. Sprint and tmobile have connectors on their equipment so a portable generator can be connected. They do this even when generators are allowed. There is a colo site behind a place that I frequently visit. VZW, Sprint, AT&T, Nextel and tmobile are on it. The only generator there is for the VZW equipment. According to the Sprint guy I bumped into one time they have 4 trailer mounted generators to cover their local 30,000 square mile market and they are located over an hour's drive from here. > Also, in natural disasters, often the wireless networks are overloaded > or go down, but landlines still work. During the bad hurricane season a [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > but to sacrifice capacity, "We will sacrifice the capacity piece to try > to attain blanket coverage as much as possible." Thinking of this old AUTOVON relay site very near where I lived when I went to high school: http://www.gleepy.net/gallery/images/napoli1.jpg http://www.gleepy.net/gallery/images/napoli2.jpg http://www.gleepy.net/gallery/images/napoli3.jpg I had found documentation on one web site showing that a Solar[tm] backup generator made by International Harvester was ready to kick in at that site any time power went down. Given that it was a deep rural area, wind could easily take down a power line and knock power out. These days VZW maintains a cell site there and has done so since 1999. I wonder if that Solar generator is still there. SignatureCurtis R. Anderson, Co-creator of "Gleepy the Hen", still Email not munged, SpamAssassin [tm] in effect. http://www.gleepy.net/ mailto:gleepy@intelligencia.com mailto:gleepy@gleepy.net (and others) Yahoo!: gleepythehen > I think that with a low enough price point that unlimited becomes > useful for those who want to drop a landline and go all cellular all > the time. I find it amusing to see all the news reports of how the $99.99 unlimited plan is a "price war." Yeah, it's a price war to get subscribers to increase their monthly expenditure for wireless. > I find it amusing to see all the news reports of how the $99.99 > unlimited plan is a "price war." Yeah, it's a price war to get > subscribers to increase their monthly expenditure for wireless. I work with a guy (salesman) who, last year, had a 2000 minute plan (don't know with whom)--and every month he was 1000 minutes over. Let's see, that was probably a $125/month plan, and $0.25 overage, so he was probably $375/month. No, I'd say plenty of people will eat this up. >> I find it amusing to see all the news reports of how the $99.99 >> unlimited plan is a "price war." Yeah, it's a price war to get [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > > No, I'd say plenty of people will eat this up. Yeah, I'm sure there are plenty of sales people that would benefit, but for the vast majority of subscribers, I don't believe that it's much of a deal. >>> I find it amusing to see all the news reports of how the $99.99 >>> unlimited plan is a "price war." Yeah, it's a price war to get [quoted text clipped - 11 lines] > but for the vast majority of subscribers, I don't believe that it's > much of a deal. The answer to this question is amazingly simple- look at ARPU for each carrier. With voice ARPU generally being in the $55-60 range, $100 users are going to represent the upper end of the scale. With the influx of lower creditworthy customers on all networks over the last three years, there will be more customers on the network below that line than above it. > The answer to this question is amazingly simple- look at ARPU for each > carrier. With voice ARPU generally being in the $55-60 range, $100 users > are going to represent the upper end of the scale. With the influx of > lower creditworthy customers on all networks over the last three years, > there will be more customers on the network below that line than above it. True- the question is what percentage of customers are actually above the $99 mark now- I suspect it's not too big a percentage, and can you con enough $60-80 users to jump to $99 to offset that. > > I find it amusing to see all the news reports of how the $99.99 > > unlimited plan is a "price war." Yeah, it's a price war to get [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > > No, I'd say plenty of people will eat this up. Agreed. My cousin, a consultant back east who uses 3000 or so daytime minutes a month is still on a grandfathered ATTWS GSM Charter plan (a $99 unlimited plan they originally used to con suckers from switching from their excellent TDMA/analog network to their, at the time, very crummy GSM one.) Since the merger he's been stuck buying unlocked handsets to upgrade since the "new" AT&T can't sell him a subsidized phone that'll accept his blue "old" AT&T SIM, and won't switch him to a "new" orange AT&T SIM unless he takes a new plan. Ironically, I'll bet he'll probably switch to Ve izon- Verizon has a little better reception in his neighborhood, and he uses a Verizon EVDO laptop card for mobile data- it works on his boat, where the AT&T 3G card he tried first doesn't always reach- (apparently "Extended UMTS" didn't make it to Rhode Island!) ;-) IIRC, Verizon will knock the PC card rate down from $79 to $59 if you also have a voice plan. The $20 savings didn't justify dumping the AT&T Charter plan, but when Verizon offers the $99 unlimited, he can port over and save the $20/month on the data card. Maybe he should try extended GSM. :) >> > I find it amusing to see all the news reports of how the $99.99 >> > unlimited plan is a "price war." Yeah, it's a price war to get [quoted text clipped - 29 lines] > dumping the AT&T Charter plan, but when Verizon offers the $99 unlimited, > he can port over and save the $20/month on the data card. "SMS" <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in message news:47bdabbd$0$36387 > It seems that too many consumers look at the "unlimited" part, without > understanding that $99 is a) not really $99, and b) not such a great deal > compared to non-unlimited plans, Non-unlimited? Is that like, limited? |
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