T-Mobile has decided to allow all Sprint customers to get a T-Mobile SIM. Here’s why that’s a bad thing.
TNX is T-Mobile’s name for moving Sprint customers to T-Mobile SIM cards. Currently, when a Sprint customer visits a T-Mobile store, the system will let the store rep know if the customer is eligible for TNX, and allow the switch. If the customer is in an area where they would be worse off (sometimes left with no signal at all) the system will not allow the customer to be TNX’d. That’s about to change.
According to a trusted source, starting on or around August 10th, T-Mobile’s systems will consider all Sprint customers as “eligible” for TNX. The system will apparently warn of congestion issues if applicable for a customer, but will no longer prevent reps from assigning a T-Mobile SIM. Thus, responsibility for judging if TNX will work for the customer is now on the rep.
At first glance, this may not seem like too big of a deal. However, T-Mobile offers “spiffs”, or one off bonuses, for every customer a rep switches from a Sprint SIM to a T-Mobile SIM. It’s easy to see how this might be a bit of a conflict of interest. In addition, the store itself is encouraged as a whole to switch customers to T-Mobile SIMs. This is yet another reason a rep may decide to TNX a customer regardless of a congestion/bad signal warning message.
T-Mobile has also apparently hinted that future flagship devices will only work on the T-Mobile network. This could mean the upcoming new iPhone, future Samsung devices, etc may actually require T-Mobile SIM cards to use, and will not work on the legacy Sprint network. This is likely a manufacturer decision to phase out the soon to be extinct network.
Obviously this isn’t great for legacy Sprint holdouts. So far, however, this isn’t a “forced” migration. Sprint customers may just have to face facts that TNX will eventually be required to continue service with T-Mobile. If you’re on a Sprint plan and want to just get it over with, you can order a SIM online here.
