C Spire Averts Surplus Data Charges for its Customers

With its new customer-friendly initiative, C Spire Wireless is helping its customers avoid surplus data charges.

The program seems to be based on a strong working model. A text message alert is typically sent to the customer when 20% of the monthly data plan remains and once the monthly limit is reached, C Spire gives them a chance to purchase “Top Up” data and those charges are then deducted from their balance. Subscribers also have the option to choose from 500 MB data for $10, 1 GB data for $15 and 3GB for $45. Moreover, if there is any unused data, it can be added to the next month’s plan. 

Suzy Hays, senior vice president for customer marketing noted “Our approach is simple: if you reach your monthly data limit, we’ll let you decide if you want more”.  She also said, “We won’t use it as an opportunity to charge you huge fees without ever asking.”

C Spire found out that smartphone users in the U.S use up to 2.98 GB of data in a month on an average, but 30% of the users consume about 500 MB. This report fits with Chetan Sharma, an industry analyst who shared that U.S subscribers consume around 2.5 GB of data every month during the first quarter. 

Hays said, “It’s a real dilemma because most users struggle to gauge accurately how much data they really need”. He also said “If you purchase too much data, you’re wasting money. If you buy too little, you get hit with surprise overage fees or your data speeds get throttled or slowed down.”

On the overage alert program, it is doubtful if C Spire is working with some other vendor. But on its video passes, the carrier had worked with monetization and network analytics vendor Openwave Mobility in the past. C spire spokesman did not comment immediately on the same.

John Legere, T-Mobile CEO, is constantly pressuring Verizon Wireless, Sprint and AT&T Mobility to reduce surplus charges on their data plans, as T-Mobile did a year back. Legere announced that if the petition started by him reaches 250,000 signatures, a message will be sent to them that can’t be ignored. Change.org/AbolishOverages online petition has nearly 218,000 signatures.

AT&T Offers ‘Rollover Data’ to its Select GoPhone Prepaid Users

AT&T Mobility is allowing a few of its GoPhone prepaid users to be a part of the carrier’s “Rollover Data” program. AT&T began to offer rollover data to their subscribers on Mobile Share Value shared data plans around late January.

From May 15 onwards, users who had opted for $60 and $45 monthly plans offered by the carrier will be permitted to roll over their unused data for the next 30 days. This, however, will continue as long as they can renew on time. All of the existing customers qualify for rollover data following renewal post May 15. To be able to use this service, consumers must be using a smartphone.

There are many other carriers too who have offered the data rollover facility for their prepaid users. T-Mobile US brought its rollover data program, which it stated as “Data Stash,” to its nominal prepaid users in late March. The plan was only made accessible to normal post-paid customer of T-Mobile and was available for a stipulated timeframe.

T-Mobile’s Data Stash as a plan has been made accessible only to those who opt for the plan with at least 3 GB of LTE data in the case of smartphones or, at least 1 GB for tabs every month. Additionally, T-Mobile provides every user with Data Stash 10 GB of LTE limit data for free. As a policy, users will lose any unused data post one year from the time it is deposited into their Data Stash.

Fortunately, prepaid MVNO TracFone Wireless launched its “Unlimited Carryover” plan in the previous year. According to the provider, the plan permits its customers to retain any unused minutes, texts and data for as long as their service remains active.

Sprint Beats T-Mobile in Prepaid Net Adds for Q4

Sprint is finally being rewarded for the promotion it held in December wherein the telecom giant offered to cut customers’ bills to half if they made a switch from Verizon Wireless or AT&T Mobility to Sprint. Sprint’ CEO Marcelo Claure said at the 2015 Citi Global Internet, Media & Telecommunications Conference that the company’s cumulative net adds had come close to 1 million in the fourth quarter. If compared to the fourth quarter of 2013, the company had added merely 477,000 new subscribers by that period.

Roughly 400,000 of the new subscribers that joined the Sprint family were prepaid net adds. This substantially outdoes the fourth-quarter prepaid net adds of T-Mobile. T-Mobile also shared that it had 266,000 branded prepaid net adds during the fourth quarter.

Among other things, Claure also accepted that the highest churn in the industry was also Sprint’s. However, the company is diligently working on the efforts geared towards controlling that problem. Sharing the plans for the rest of the year, Claure said that the company will be continuing with its popular promotion "cut your bill in half" during 2015. The company’s major focus will lie on its marketing message surrounding that offer.

The CEO of Sprint appreciated the device leasing program of the company. He claims that the trend initiated by the company is quite disruptive for the telecom industry. The iPhone for Life is a program that provides customers a lease period of 30 months, at the same time reducing the monthly cost of the iPhone to $18 for the 16 GB iPhone 6 or $23 for the 16 GB iPhone 6 Plus. 

Other news shared by Sprint says that it has secured three new vendor financing deals for 2.5 GHz network gear totalling $1.8 billion. The deals include an agreement for $800 million with Nokia Networks that is due to mature in June 2021, a deal with Samsung for $750 million due for maturation in December 2022, and a $250 million deal with Alcatel-Lucent that is set to mature in December 2021.

Sprint also boomed its credit relationship with Export Development Canada by $300 million and amended the terms of its existing secured equipment credit facility.

AT&T, Verizon, Samsung, Apple in 2014: A Competition Review

It often seems obvious for executives from wireless carriers to comment at investor conferences on how they think the industry is fiercely competitive. Such a comment sounds even more obvious when it comes from executives at AT&T Mobility and Verizon Wireless. However, the year that went by has justified their statements thoroughly as every other cellphone network carrier felt the tremors of stiff competition in the marketplace.

In reality, the pricing competition started gaining momentum right from January of 2014 and only kept picking up pace during the rest of the year. In fact, it got a real boost when the merger dialogue between Sprint and T-Mobile US broke down. Although financial analysts have been chafing about the probable impact of the ongoing price competition on the long-term margins and investment of the network carriers, it is, somehow, a great development for customers.

In the smartphone arena too, the pricing competition is pacing up as Google, Microsoft, Mozilla and their device partners look out for fresh customers in the emerging markets. Parallel to this has been an unusual development that saw average selling prices going down with low-cost providers like Xiaomi coming up. Although Samsung Electronics and Apple are secure in their own niches as the No. 1 and No. 2 smartphone players, respectively, pressure has mounted as well and is greater than what they have been facing until now.

Further on, the overwhelming $44 billion auction for the AWS-3 spectrum has brought to the surface carriers’ desire for extra network capacity. The hefty amount being spent in the auction highlights even better the challenges that smaller carriers are facing. It is a bigger problem for those who have realized that they are falling short of the resources to continue and compete with the Tier 1 operators. As a result, such operators have entirely abandoned their wireless business.

Competition certainly heated up in 2014 on various accounts this year, and it only appears ready to heighten up ahead into 2015. The resulting disruption should then hopefully illicit greater innovation from carriers and device manufacturers.