Prepaid cost per minute when mixing top-up values?

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B. Wright - 30 Jun 2006 09:54 GMT

I noticed something interesting when adding a $100 top-up to a
new ToGo prepaid phone: When I added the card any remaining balance
from the initial $15.00 included went from being charged at $0.25/minute
to $0.10/minute, thus, giving me 2.5x the minutes on the previous
balance. What I'm curious about is, does it work in reverse? For
example, if I have a large remaining balance from a $100 top-up at
$0.10/minute and I add a $10 card do I get screwed and the entire
balance is charged at the ridiculously high $10 top-up card per minute
rate or do they just average it at that point?

Next time somone adds a top-up like this post and let us know
what happens. Hopefully they at least average the cost of minutes
instead of locking them to the rate of last used top-up.

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Dave - 30 Jun 2006 14:55 GMT

> I noticed something interesting when adding a $100 top-up to a
> new ToGo prepaid phone: When I added the card any remaining balance
[quoted text clipped - 9 lines]
> what happens. Hopefully they at least average the cost of minutes
> instead of locking them to the rate of last used top-up.

Why would you add a $10 top-up card when you still have a large balance
of minutes to use. Usually the $100 cards have a 1 year expiration date
so there would be no need to use a $10 top up card for quite a while.

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Michael Wileman - 30 Jun 2006 17:09 GMT

>> I noticed something interesting when adding a $100 top-up to a
>> new ToGo prepaid phone: When I added the card any remaining balance
[quoted text clipped - 9 lines]
>> what happens. Hopefully they at least average the cost of minutes
>> instead of locking them to the rate of last used top-up.

>Why would you add a $10 top-up card when you still have a large balance
>of minutes to use. Usually the $100 cards have a 1 year expiration date
>so there would be no need to use a $10 top up card for quite a while.

Lots of people use the $100 refills initially to get the
one-year expiration and the 10 cent / minute rate, but they
don't actually use up the minutes during the year. It would
be very useful to be able to extend the expiration on those
minutes by simply adding a $10 refill.

I also noticed the revaluation of my minutes when I used a
$100 card, and wondered whether it works the same in the
opposite direction. I almost always use 1000 minutes before
the year is out, so I never had the occasion to test it, but
I am curious. If anyone has done it, please post.

Mike

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PDA Man - 30 Jun 2006 17:24 GMT

This issue has been analyzed and discussed at great length at Howard Forums.
You will NOT suffer any decrease in your existing Value or Gold Rewards
minute rate when you add something smalleras the $10 card. But, there is
actually advantages in most cases to have a certain amount of minutes in an
acct when topping off, so that the decrement rate will get you more minutes.
Go to the Prepaid forum at www.howardforums.com . In fact Ill make it easy
for you, I had started a thread where we disussed it in great detail so it
was easy to find. Once you hit Gold Rewards, you will find you will most
ALWAYS get a few more minutes then face value of the card. Sometimes quite a
few.

http://www.howardforums.com/showthread.php?t=909841

Be advised, that as of July 1, TMO2GO $10 Crads for Gold Rewards will only
add 35 minutes, no longer 50. That is still the 15% Bonus. Also, Incomming
SMS will no longer be FREE.

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Michael Wileman - 30 Jun 2006 22:32 GMT

>Be advised, that as of July 1, TMO2GO $10 Crads for Gold
>Rewards will only add 35 minutes, no longer 50. That is
>still the 15% Bonus. Also, Incomming SMS will no longer be
>FREE.

I received an SMS notifying about the 35 minutes, but it was
presented so that it might easily be assumed to be an
improvement.

It said nothing about paying for incoming SMS. Is that only
for the $10 refill or for all prepaid? The t-mobile website
still says free incoming SMS.

Mike

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B. Wright - 02 Jul 2006 03:09 GMT

In alt.cellular.t-mobile Michael Wileman <jwileman@panix.com> wrote:

> >Be advised, that as of July 1, TMO2GO $10 Crads for Gold
> >Rewards will only add 35 minutes, no longer 50. That is
> >still the 15% Bonus. Also, Incomming SMS will no longer be
> >FREE.

> I received an SMS notifying about the 35 minutes, but it was
> presented so that it might easily be assumed to be an
> improvement.

> It said nothing about paying for incoming SMS. Is that only
> for the $10 refill or for all prepaid? The t-mobile website
> still says free incoming SMS.

I just got an SMS about the incoming now being charged at
$.05/minute today, so unfortunately, it seems to be true. It said "as
of Aug 15, 2006". Too bad we aren't grandfathered, but I guess that's
one drawback of pre-paid. Does anyone know if the contract people are
also now being charged for incoming SMS? Are the previous contracts
grandfathered?

Charging for incoming SMS is one of the ridiculously stupid
practices of US carriers. No carrier that I have used outside of the US
has ever done this with the very uncommon exception of a few that may
charge to receive SMS when roaming in other countries (even then, most
don't do this). I used to get a lot of SMS spam on one of my numbers
and I would have been furious if I were being charged for that, the
carrier couldn't tell me where it was coming from and it took a long
time for me to finally track down and stop the source. The carriers
that charge always have the lame copout of "well, disable SMS
completely". Wow! That's a great answer when I've heard that most of
them who claim to be able to do this can't even get it right even when
it is requested and you continuing receiving messages and being charged.
I don't know if these carriers receive compensation for incoming SMS
like most carriers do for incoming calls terminated on their network,
but they may, and the only situation where I can see that it might cost
them some resources is the free web/e-mail to SMS some offer. I would
rather see that go away and not be charged for incoming SMS than have
some free gateway around where anyone can spam the sh*t out of it for
free and cost me money.

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Walt Kienzle - 02 Jul 2006 18:40 GMT

> In alt.cellular.t-mobile Michael Wileman <jwileman@panix.com> wrote:

[snip]

> I just got an SMS about the incoming now being charged at
> $.05/minute today, so unfortunately, it seems to be true. It said "as
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
> Charging for incoming SMS is one of the ridiculously stupid
> practices of US carriers.

[snip]

Yes, contract people are now being charged for incoming SMS, and its $.10
per message, not just $.05. They/I used to get 50 free messages per month -
inbound or outbound. I don't know for certain, but I don't think that
previous contracts were grandfathered. Based on my conversations with a
T-Mobile customer service agent, I don't think there was notification of the
policy change. The SMS allowance was quietly dropped from the billing. The
agent told me he had several complaints from those that noticed. After
returning to T-Mobile from Cingular, primarily for that messaging benefit
and finding it was gone was a true disappointment. I planned to devise a
way to switch to pre-paid, but the SMS advantage is gone there too.
Unfortunate.

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-= Hawk =- - 30 Jun 2006 22:34 GMT

>Also, Incomming SMS will no longer be FREE.

Could you point out where on the T-Mobile site they state this?
The features for prepaid on their site still state:
Text messaging ($0.10 to send, FREE to receive)
Picture messaging ($0.25 to send, FREE to receive)

The my.t-mobile.com site reports the same thing:
Incoming messages: absolutely free
Outgoing messages: $0.10 per message

Reply to this Message

PDA Man - 01 Jul 2006 00:52 GMT

First lesson you will learn is NEVER EVER rely on TMOBILES web site (or
Customer Service Reps) as a clearinghouse for information, ever. The Tmobile
"Net Community" consists of people with years of involvement with the
company, as customers , employees or agents,, (in my case as an agent and
dealer at different times since it was Sprint Spectrum, VoiceStream and now
TMOBILE in Wash DC market), and have developed connections & contacts as
well. In the case of Howard Forums you have alot of Employees, both in
Sales and Infrastructure, and 3rd party Sales associates and so the news
gets out. And most of the time, it is right on. Only problem is, like most
wireless companies, when it comes to changes in policy, rate plan changes,
new releases, etc it does not always occur as planned.

This is the price you pay when you want information off the net, newsgroups
and forums. And when it comes to TMOBILE as an information source, FORGET
IT. You could call TMO2GO Customer service right now, talk to 10 different
reps, and get at least 5-6 different answers regarding these matters. That
is a guarantee.

>>Also, Incomming SMS will no longer be FREE.
>
[quoted text clipped - 6 lines]
> Incoming messages: absolutely free
> Outgoing messages: $0.10 per message

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bruceR - 30 Jun 2006 17:56 GMT

Speculation can be so much fun. Has the idea of actually looking at TMo's
website or calling them and asking not occurred to anyone?

Here is what their website says on the TMobile2Go aptly titled "Refills"
page:

"How can I get the most value for my refill money?
Add $100 in refills to become a Gold Rewards customer. Get 15% more minutes
with every refill and keep your minutes for a full year (does not apply to
Sidekick®).
When do my Gold Rewards rates take effect?

Once $100.00 in refills has been added to your account, you automatically
qualify for Gold Rewards and will receive 15% more minutes with every
refill. And your unused minutes won't expire for a full year!"

As to "why someone would add a $10 refill to an account with lot's of
minutes," consider that one might receive a refill card as a gift or a
parent might add some minutes online so Junior has no excuse not to call
home.

Bottom line here is that once you accumulate $100 in refills, you get a 15%
bonus on all additional refills.

<jwileman@panix.com>wrote:

> > > I noticed something interesting when adding a $100 top-up to a
> > > new ToGo prepaid phone: When I added the card any remaining
[quoted text clipped - 29 lines]
>
> Mike

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sylvan butler - 30 Jun 2006 21:41 GMT

> Bottom line here is that once you accumulate $100 in refills, you get a 15%
> bonus on all additional refills.

Which does not tell the whole story, not even close.

I just added a $10 card (phone was due to expire). It added 65 minutes.
Another oddity... Last year when I added minutes they were valued at
about $0.40 each. This time, it added exactly $10 to the account.

And I _HATE_ that incoming SMS/MMS will no longer be free!!!!!

sdb

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B. Wright - 02 Jul 2006 03:00 GMT

In alt.cellular.t-mobile Dave <daves1955@verizon.net> wrote:

> Why would you add a $10 top-up card when you still have a large balance
> of minutes to use. Usually the $100 cards have a 1 year expiration date
> so there would be no need to use a $10 top up card for quite a while.

Maybe because I infrequently live in the US, don't use my phone
that much when I am here, but get tired of constantly getting new SIM
cards and numbers when I do come here? I added the $100 just to get the
year expiry on the balance and to be able to extend it with a $10 topup
for another year next time, there will likely be a large balance still
on it at that time. Not everyone fits into the mold of your usage
pattern, imagine that!

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