Sprint May Have Unlimited Data Plans, But Not Unlimited Customers

mitcheli writes "Sprint announced a Q2 loss of $1.6B as 2 million subscribers left their service. While Sprint remains one of very few carriers to continue to allow unlimited data on their networks, the failure to reconcile two competing network technologies (iDEN Nextel and CDMA Sprint) combined with the lack of upgrades to their network and degrading service prompted a mass exodus of subscribers from their network. Of course the fact that during the iPhone 5 release, Sprint openly advertised that their iPhone would not be carrier locked, only to turn around and push out an OTA two months later that locked them probably didn't help much either."

Lack of upgrades?

[afidel]

Sprint's in the middle of a complete network overhaul (called network vision) that will bring LTE to almost every cell site by the end of 2014 while significantly upgrading both the antenna's and backhaul at most locations bringing better coverage and better speeds. It hasn't gone nearly as quickly as Sprint's original timetable laid out, but they're less than 6 months behind that fairly aggressive timetable. I know I come off sounding like fanboi but it really annoys me when people can't get their facts straight and use that lack of knowledge to tear down one of the last hopes we have for real competition in the cellphone market in the US. Not only does Sprint compete against the big boys but by being friendly to MVNO's they foster new concepts that help to drive down costs (see Virgin Mobile (now part of Sprint) and Republic Wireless for examples).

Re:Lack of upgrades?

[dietdew7]

They haven't done a good job of informing their customers of the upgrades. I've used Sprint for over 4 years and paid for unlimited data and 4G access. Unfortunately they don't have 4G anywhere near me so I've paid for something I can't use. It also seems that 3G service has declined in the last six months, slower spotty coverage. Unless I'm on WiFi my phone is frustratingly useless.

Unlimited means nothing if the network sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why I had to leave Sprint after many years of being a customer: degrading network, and a poorly handled network upgrade in my city.
Having an unlimited plan means nothing if you can't do a simple google search.
The final straw for me was one day when I was running errands all over the city, and kept trying to look up something online but couldn't get connected no matter where I was; at that point I had to ask myself what I was paying for anymore.

Re:t-mobile is the best low cost carrier

[Mordok-DestroyerOfWo]

Caveat: As always, YMMV. I went over on my T-Mobile data a few months ago while at a conference. To my surprise even at 5GB I wasn't throttled. When I got back to my hometown I walked into one of their stores while my wife was shopping and asked them about it. The answer I got was that they reserve the right to throttle if you go over and that it's not an automatic thing. I have no idea if this is correct since in my experience salespeople are about as ill-informed as viewers of Fox News, but it is something to think about.

Re:Lack of upgrades?

[wjcofkc]

Until recently, I supported smartphones at Sprint. As a consequence, I had a front row seat to the Network Vision rollout from both the strictly corporate perspective as well as from the perspective of access to a wealth of robust network analysis tools. I can tell you that it is happening as quickly as is possible. One problem for LTE rollouts regarding all carriers is the simple fact that no one predicted that all of a sudden 200+ countries would suddenly start ordering massive amounts of LTE equipment from the very few companies that sell it... so there is a run LTE equipment which has been a speed bump. However, the Network Vision rollout has a lot more going on than just the LTE rollout but I don't have time get into that. Personally, I just got Sprint LTE in my area and regularly get 30+ down and 8 - 10 up. Not bad. One thing that has been confusing for customers is the difference between Sprint's 4G WiMax and LTE. A lot of customers currently getting great WiMax coverage are buying LTE phones in areas that don't have LTE yet, not realizing there is a difference (stores should explain this better), consequently they go from 8 - 10 down and 2 - 4 up to 3g, when they call up and find out what has happened from me (formerly), it's usually too late to take the phone back at which point they get understandably upset, pay their ETF, and go to another carrier. There are other complexities as well. Also, I have a good friend who works at T-Mobile and the way they are selling phones and service now really is a sweat deal to the point I might make the switch. However, it also needs to be said that Sprint has adopted a very similar model that is taking place as a pilot program in limited areas and through stores only. I think a lot of the reason they are shedding customers is due to their aggressive marketing for 4G LTE and unlimited data. A whole lot of the country has yet to have their 4G LTE switched on, and no one cares about unlimited data over 3g, so it is kind of misleading. Another part of the problem is the way they advertise the number of cities that now have LTE, the thing there is that they are concentrating their rollouts primarily in very small towns which is an artificial way of inflating their numbers - which is also confusing for customers. Basically their rollout is on schedule but their dubious ahead-of-time marketing is killing them.

T-mobile is gaining ground.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Their no-contract plans are good. Despite a strong smear job by some Attorney General, (probably paid under the table by the big carriers), their phones are not locked once they are paid for. Unlimited talk, text and data, throttle down to 120 kbps after 500 MB, (10 Mbps before). 2GB more for 10$/month/line. 10 more for unlimited. When I got my nexus 4 from Google directly they gave me a micro simcard for free in their kiosk. Another nexus4 I saw from the store did not have as much junk pre loaded. No surprises so far.

My brother was saying that T-mobile benefited immensely in the failed take over big by AT&T. Apparently they had fine print, saying AT&T should give T-Mobile some 3 billion dollars and access to its network, if the deal was stopped by the Feds. So suddenly T-Mobile's coverage area increased tremendously and got some money too. But other are saying that still, T-mobile's coverage is its weak spot.

Re:Why I left

[AlphaWolf_HK]

I'm one of the Sprint leavers. Here's what happened in my case:

The Phoenix area is horribly neglected by Sprint. The quality of service continues to drop, and they've been promising Phoenix customers that 4g is just a few months away for the last few years. Their 3g service barely comes in at dialup speeds, and when your phone needs to do something as simple as say update an app, the phone has to burn through its battery for about a half hour for even the smaller apps just to struggle to get data. This happens with pretty much every phone model out there because the data services are so horrible. In spite of these horribly bad data rates, just the mere fact that you own a smart phone they label the service as "premium data" and charge an extra $10 per month per phone. Their excuse is that because you own a smartphone, you'll use more data, ignoring the fact that their data is so horribly slow and wasteful on battery that you always end up relying on wifi anyways.

I got out of my Sprint contract by doing the roaming trick, and so have a lot of Sprint customers:

http://www.sprintusers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=229968 [sprintusers.com]

T-mobile service is by far superior, by the way. Not only is it a third the price (T-mobile costs me $115 after taxes for 5 lines unlimited everything, sprint was $300 for 1500 shared minutes,) but the data services are reliable and fast as hell compared to Sprint. Sure it's not unlimited 4g, but if I pay that extra $10 Sprint was charging anyways it becomes unlimited 4g. However I find that I don't ever go above my limit anyways, so it doesn't matter, and even if I did there's never any data overage, it just goes to Edge speeds which are still MUCH faster than Sprint's 3g. T-mobile also has two (free) options you can add to your lines to completely block third party billing (from text services, 900 numbers, etc) as well as all international text/calls. Every month I had to call Sprint to fix some overage they did in error or sometimes getting signed up for a text spam service, whereas with T-Mobile I've never had to do that. Not once.

Another nice thing about t-mobile is it supports the HD Voice feature of my Nexus 4, and in addition to that when somebody calls me it actually rings immediately, whereas with Sprint the other person can hear up to four rings before my phone finally rang, often causing me to miss their call to voicemail. That and Sprint dropped calls like crazy, and when I confronted them about it they told me that their systems measured my quality of service to be 100% - and get this, when I was on the phone with the CSR, my call was dropped, and she actually called me back and then played stupid like it wasn't their problem.

I honestly have no idea how the hell Sprint intends to last long term. I'm rather shocked that they are a more popular carrier than t-mobile as their service is so much worse and by far more expensive. Plus it seems that T-Mobile has already reached 160m pop with their LTE coverage, whereas Sprint just reached 200m and they've been at it longer.

If you read between the lines of Sprint's SEC filings, their current plan is to keep revenues up by increasing the fees that each subscriber pays. They noted that in a previous filing by saying that over the last year their customers pay an average of $2 per month more than they did a year earlier, which was their way of sustaining themselves in the face of heavy subscriber losses. They do this in various ways, one way is by scaling back subscriber discounts, notice how they got rid of their premier program and they reworked their billing system so that discounts only apply to a single line instead of the whole account like every other carrier does, and lately they've been cutting people off of their discounts entirely (you now have to go through a periodic renewal process every so often.)