Update: A T-Mobile spokesperson just delivered the following comment confirming the rate plan move for grandfathered/legacy customers:
Maintaining thousands of rate plans is the norm in the industry, but we think it creates unnecessary complexity. Simple is better, which is why we’re reducing the number of older plans in our systems. We’re giving customers on these plans the opportunity to choose a plan that best meets their needs. For the vast majority, their plan will provide similar or better features at a comparable price.
As we move beyond the set of UnCarrier announcements that have taken place since March, it’s become especially clear that T-Mobile wants to migrate their customer base over to the Simple Choice rate plan offerings. There’s little question that this is the direction and future of T-Mobile and now it looks as if they are going to slowly start “forcing” customers over to new plans. A recently leaked image courtesy of HowardForums matches up with a comment posted on a recent TmoNews post that highlights T-Mobile working to “move” customers to new rate plans.
The letter sent to a T-Mobile customer who posted the image on HowardForums thanks the customer for his/her loyalty and advises that a new rate plan has been “chosen” for them. There’s no telling when or if this will begin going out to customers en masse on grandfathered plans or which rate plans will qualify to receive this letter.
All of this matches up to the poster on TmoNews that predicted all of this a week ago. According to TmoNews reader “Shhhhhhh,” T-Mobile has plans to “force-migrate” customers to a new Value Plan. According to the full comment, legacy/grandfathered plans will be retired, no migration fees will be collected and customers will be offered an opportunity to cancel service penalty free should they not like the new plan. There’s clearly some truth to “Shhhhh” comment as he/she accurately predicted these letters had already been mailed to single-line customers.
So what’s the bottom line? Well, we don’t know exactly what T-Mobile has in store and while the comment below details some of what we might expect from T-Mobile in the coming weeks, there’s no telling what the UnCarrier has will do until anything is official.
Hit the HowardForums link below for the full thread or take in the comment below and begin hypothesizing T-Mobile’s next move.
Specifically, “Shhhhhhh” posted:
“ALL customers, no matter how old or how cheap your plan is, will be force-migrated to a new Value Plan. Unlimited minutes will be the ONLY plan, with different pricing not available to customers unless being force-migrated. All legacy plans will be retired indefinitely, no migration fees for anyone on legacy plans, and your price may drop or increase when getting moved to the new plans. You will have until 2/1/2014 to cancel service with no termination fee should you not like the plan you will be forced to.
Thankfully, single line Unlim Minute plans will start at just $20/MO vs the current $50 (again, not available to consumers, only those being force migrated, based on your specific needs). Once the force-migration finishes by December, it will be 100% Value or newest Classic with Bridge to Value as your only upgrade option, priced at the advertised rate, not the special price for forced-migrated customers.
Last, deposits are 100% gone for new lines of service, regardless of credit score, but credit score will still determine down payment and EIP amounts for full priced phones.”
and
“ANYONE BEING FORCE-MIGRATED WILL RECEIVE SPECIAL, UNIQUE, AND/OR DISCOUNTED PRICING ON RATE PLANS; prices that are not advertised and will ONLY be available to current Tmobile customers being force-migrated.
If you didn’t like the price of the currently advertised Uncarrier plans, then consider this a blessing in disguise, as you will be able to get all the benefits of Uncarrier, at a monthly cost lower than what you see advertised today. Some will get more, save money, break even, and only in extreme cases of very old legacy plans with no features will you incur a price increase.
To give you a detailed idea to ease your mind, currently there are over 350 different rate plans across all tmobile customers since they started in the USA many years ago. This transition will not bring those 350 down to just 1 plan (the plan you know of as the current Simple Choice Value Unlimited Everything $50/$30/$10). It will bring those 350 down to just 50. That’s still 49 more options than you see advertised currently, to ensure everyone is happy with the cost and benefit of being 100% Uncarrier.
Letters which detail the specialty pricing offered unique to your account(s) will be mailed October 10th for Family Plan rates, and Single Line letters have just been mailed already.
Uncarrier for everyone! Get pumped! And look for your letter in the mail if you’re on an old legacy plan to see what you can get! This is a great change!