T-mobile unlimited text, phone, data at $5/month

[P5-133XL]

I have an emergency phone that I keep in my car that I uses a plan giving only 20 minutes/month for $5/month. It had a dedicated purpose and I was fine paying the $5 for the security. Apparently as of 5/1/2014 T-mobile will be upgrading that plan to unlimited text, data, phone and still maintain the price.

My immediate reaction is it is too good to be true. Next reaction was, when will T-mobile delete grand-fathered plans? Then, it occurs that I should take advantage of this by upgrading the phone to a modern smart-phone . Apparently, I can add up to 5 phone lines and two devices (i.e. tablerts) on to the plan at no cost. How can T-mobile make money off this? What am I missing?

 

[ddrueding]

There must be something missing, because that to way too good to be true. If it isn't I'll take 200

 

[P5-133XL]

http://t-mobile-email.com/servlet/formlink/f?luhIptQURTBV8b9VSDTCWUUUV8fyXb9X2b9VSDDASXSURSRRCV2b9VSURSRRCVGf6beX6990G11VlmjgLjJhuimlLjxJhuJHklQgLl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...bile-kills-all-overage-charges-for-consumers/

So what am I missing?

 

[Howell]

They won't be able to keep it up. "The company reported in February that its losses grew to $20 million in the last quarter of 2013 even as it added a total of 1.6 million customers in the same quarter." Are you on a month to month contract that could be cancelled with notice?

 

[P5-133XL]

Yes, the plan is cancelable for no contract more than month to month remains. It started out as an old T-mobile (300 minutes for $20) plan, for the same purpose, that many years ago, I tried to cancel because Consumer Cellular was doing 30 minutes for $10 and my current plan (20 minutes for $5) was what T-mobile offered to prevent me from leaving. The pre-paid phones didn't work for the use because those minutes expire.

For the dedicated use of an emergency phone, The number of minutes per month is irrelevant because it is never used except for an emergency and those happen rarely. So all I cared about was minimizing the monthly price. So the plan was perfect for its use. If I exceed the 20 minutes the cost/minute is outrageous but 20 minutes should be fine for most events and in a true emergency, who cares about cost...

I am not going to invest in a smart phone if they are going to kill the plan. At 5$/month it seems reasonable but at a normal market price of $40+/month much less reasonable and I do not need it. I can easily proceed by waiting to see what happens but if they don't cancel the plan the I will incur some missed opportunity cost but if they do cancel then I'm stuck paying for the phone and replacing the plan costing far more. At the very minimum, I'm not going to do anything till 5/1 when the plan converts and I can see exactly what I have.

 

[sechs]

As I understand it, all that they're doing is eliminating overage charges. If you already have a plan that costs per minute, text, or kilobyte, then you don't have overages on those.

I would guess that your current plan pays for text and data per use and, therefore, the only gain from this change is ostensibly unlimited voice.

 

[P5-133XL]

I understand. Perhaps that is what I am missing.