5 ms·

> T-mobile is offering a $15/month 2GB prepaid plan as part of the sweetener to get regulators to approve the merger A short term discount to break into a mark

by gowld 7y ago

> T-mobile is offering a $15/month 2GB prepaid plan as part of the sweetener to get regulators to approve the merger A short term discount to break into a market niche? That looks like overy antitrust "dumping".

jaywalk 7y ago
Hard to consider it "dumping" when you look at competitive offerings. For example, Comcast (Xfinity Mobile) offers a $12/month 1GB prepaid plan, and they don't even own the networks they use. $15/month for 2GB on your own network is entirely reasonable.
- lotsofpulp 7y ago
  I assume buying mobile service from sellers other than the network owner themselves makes you a second class citizen on the network and subject to throttling or whatever QoS they use to make your traffic lower priority. I even assume that you are getting prioritized depending on how much you pay or how politically important you are for the networks. I.e. a $20 prepaid ATT customer is lower priority than a $80 post paid unlimited customer which is lower priority than a US Senator.
  - jaywalk 7y ago
    Of course, but that's been a fact of life forever.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      Yes, I was agreeing that it isn't dumping since it's a different product since the services are lower priority than more expensive ones. But it's not explicitly stated, which now that I think about it, should be a required disclosure.
  - kube-system 7y ago
    FWIW, a lot of MVNOs on other networks were faster than first-party service on Sprint.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      I am curious for Sprint's reasons for allowing that.
      - kube-system 7y ago
        Not MVNOs on Sprint -- MVNOs on other networks. For instance, Straight Talk on AT&T isn't (or wasn't) even throttled. Other MVNOs, even if they were throttled on Verizon, were still quicker than Sprint's network.
stickfigure 7y ago
I've had a $30/mo 5GB prepaid plan from Tmobile for about 10 years now (the "walmart plan"). To this date I've not seen anything cheaper. $15/2G is getting close though.
- xnx 7y ago
  Same! until I switched to Mint Mobile just a few months ago because I was regularly hitting the bandwidth limit. I wish Google Fi was price competitive and didn't have conflicts with Google Voice, but it's just not there.
- BubRoss 7y ago
  I went from a $70 per month plan to mint mobile and now I don't even remember what I pay because it is so much cheaper ($15 or less for 2GB). I love paying for a year at a time through a really clean interface, getting a discount AND not caring about bills. The reception of t-mobile is not always great and mint uses T-Mobile, but I'm a mint shill now. T-Mobile was so terrible I couldn't even pay my bill in their store. Their service was awful and if you couldn't do something online you might as well forget it. It turned into modern banking, where going to a physical location would just get you people telling you they can't do anything and that you have to everything through their website while pretending that that isn't ridiculous.
- dougmwne 7y ago
  I've been using Mint Mobile for a few years. If you're ok being on an MVNO they use T-Mobile towers and offer an 8 GB, $20/mo plan, hotspot included. It includes unlimited calling unlike the discontinued Walmart plan.
  - DiabloD3 7y ago
    Mint Mobile is also getting the SARS uncapped data limit, too, since we're on the T-Mobile network.
    - hackmiester 7y ago
      This may be true, but fyi, it isn't necessarily true - the MVNO is the one that sets the data charges in this case. If Mint did the right thing, I'm glad, though.
JumpCrisscross 7y ago
> short term discount to break into a market niche? Dumping generally related to international trade and describes selling at a loss to drive off competition [1]. It is not clear T-Mobile is selling the plan at a loss. And it has no hope of driving AT&T or Verizon out of the wireless market. This is plain old discounting, not dumping. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy)

by gowld 7y ago

jaywalk 7y ago

Hard to consider it "dumping" when you look at competitive offerings. For example, Comcast (Xfinity Mobile) offers a $12/month 1GB prepaid plan, and they don't even own the networks they use. $15/month for 2GB on your own network is entirely reasonable.

lotsofpulp 7y ago
I assume buying mobile service from sellers other than the network owner themselves makes you a second class citizen on the network and subject to throttling or whatever QoS they use to make your traffic lower priority. I even assume that you are getting prioritized depending on how much you pay or how politically important you are for the networks. I.e. a $20 prepaid ATT customer is lower priority than a $80 post paid unlimited customer which is lower priority than a US Senator.
- jaywalk 7y ago
  Of course, but that's been a fact of life forever.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    Yes, I was agreeing that it isn't dumping since it's a different product since the services are lower priority than more expensive ones. But it's not explicitly stated, which now that I think about it, should be a required disclosure.
- kube-system 7y ago
  FWIW, a lot of MVNOs on other networks were faster than first-party service on Sprint.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    I am curious for Sprint's reasons for allowing that.
    - kube-system 7y ago
      Not MVNOs on Sprint -- MVNOs on other networks. For instance, Straight Talk on AT&T isn't (or wasn't) even throttled. Other MVNOs, even if they were throttled on Verizon, were still quicker than Sprint's network.

stickfigure 7y ago

I've had a $30/mo 5GB prepaid plan from Tmobile for about 10 years now (the "walmart plan"). To this date I've not seen anything cheaper. $15/2G is getting close though.

xnx 7y ago
Same! until I switched to Mint Mobile just a few months ago because I was regularly hitting the bandwidth limit. I wish Google Fi was price competitive and didn't have conflicts with Google Voice, but it's just not there.
BubRoss 7y ago
I went from a $70 per month plan to mint mobile and now I don't even remember what I pay because it is so much cheaper ($15 or less for 2GB). I love paying for a year at a time through a really clean interface, getting a discount AND not caring about bills. The reception of t-mobile is not always great and mint uses T-Mobile, but I'm a mint shill now. T-Mobile was so terrible I couldn't even pay my bill in their store. Their service was awful and if you couldn't do something online you might as well forget it. It turned into modern banking, where going to a physical location would just get you people telling you they can't do anything and that you have to everything through their website while pretending that that isn't ridiculous.
dougmwne 7y ago
I've been using Mint Mobile for a few years. If you're ok being on an MVNO they use T-Mobile towers and offer an 8 GB, $20/mo plan, hotspot included. It includes unlimited calling unlike the discontinued Walmart plan.
- DiabloD3 7y ago
  Mint Mobile is also getting the SARS uncapped data limit, too, since we're on the T-Mobile network.
  - hackmiester 7y ago
    This may be true, but fyi, it isn't necessarily true - the MVNO is the one that sets the data charges in this case. If Mint did the right thing, I'm glad, though.

JumpCrisscross 7y ago

> short term discount to break into a market niche? Dumping generally related to international trade and describes selling at a loss to drive off competition [1]. It is not clear T-Mobile is selling the plan at a loss. And it has no hope of driving AT&T or Verizon out of the wireless market. This is plain old discounting, not dumping. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy)