Our fears have come true: T-Mobile has confirmed that customers on Simple Choice and ONE plans will be seeing a price increase, as well as potentially older/other plans, including possibly Sprint plans.
As we previously theorized, T-Mobile is raising the price per line on a number of legacy plans. The increases are set to take effect on the June 5th billing cycle.
Customers impacted by the increase will receive texts beginning at 9am Eastern, and will arrive by 7pm Pacific time. These texts will likely be staggered throughout the day to lower volume of customers calling and visiting stores.
Impacted plans and costs
It’s possible T-Mobile is not only staggering SMS messages for impacted customers, but also the actual flags on accounts that are impacted. Customers might not be marked as affected now, but later today they could suddenly be. This is leading to a lot of confusion, which is unfortunately typical with these kinds of changes at T-Mobile.
So far, we have confirmed that plans as new as Magenta are impacted. Below is a list of our personally confirmed impacts and what value they were raised by. A $0 increase means it is a customer with the plan that did not receive the text and was told by support they are not (yet) impacted.
| Plan | Number of confirmed cases | Per-Line increase |
|---|---|---|
| Magenta | 4 | $5 |
| Magenta MAX | 4 | $2 |
| ONE | 2 | $0 |
| Magenta 55+ | 2 | $5 |
| Magenta Amplified | 1 | $2 |
| Magenta First Responder | 1 | $5 |
| ONE | 3 | $5 |
| Simple Choice | 1 | $2 |
| Simple Choice | 1 | $0 |
Simple Choice, ONE, and even Magenta plans may be seeing a price increase of $2 or $5 per line per month. This means a customer with 5 lines will see a total monthly increase of up to $25.
Important: Not all customers on a specific plan will be impacted. So far, we’ve seen ONE plans that are not impacted, and even Magenta plans that are impacted. Please be patient with customer support, and wait for a text to see exactly if and how you’re impacted.
We are told that plans covered by Price Lock are not affected, however, we’re unsure exactly what that means when it comes to plans.
ONE plans are covered by the “Un-Contract Promise” which, at the time, was defined as “a commitment T-Mobile made to customers in 2017 that only you can change what you pay and we mean it. To show how committed T-Mobile is, if you activated your account between January 2017 and April 28, 2022, we will pay your final month’s recurring service charges if we were to raise prices and you choose to leave. Just let us know within 60 days.” They really did mean it, huh.
Some business plans are also impacted. Those customers will receive texts beginning at around 1:30pm Eastern today (5/22).
Voice lines and BTS (data lines for tablets, hotspots, etc) are impacted. BTS lines will be a +$2 increase.
The following list of BTS SOC codes are impacted. This list does not include the impacted voice plans.
Free lines do not appear to be impacted by the price increase.
Existing benefits (like insider, free lines, etc) are not impacted, and will be retained.
Other plans, including older T-Mobile plans and Sprint plans, are likely impacted as well, but stay tuned to learn for sure. We are told that T-Mobile is being very vague about exactly which plans are impacted, and are instead directing employees to view accounts on a case-by-case basis to see if they have the indicator of being impacted by the price change.
The exact cost per line increase is not yet known. Retail and customer support has tools to look at accounts and see who are impacted.
How T-Mobile is handling the situation
Below are slides from the meeting this morning.
Internal document quote:
At T-Mobile we are committed to offering the best value in wireless with low prices and a best-in-class 5G network, and we have no intention of ever changing that. As costs continue to rise, for the first time in nearly a decade we’re making small adjustments to the prices of some of our oldest rate plans. The majority of our customers are not included. The small fraction of customers who are included will be notified on May 22. Included customers will see a rate plan price increase of $2 or $5 per voice line and $2 per eligible BTS line on their next bill, as early as June 5. Customer benefits, their plan type, due date, and all the value they get will remain the same.
Even with these small price changes, we still offer the lowest prices versus AT&T and Verizon with great benefits like taxes and fees included, entertainment & travel perks, and Magenta Status. What to do Contact your leader to review training content and to complete the assigned course in Magenta U before discussing these updates with customers.
Inform customers (if they ask) that we will always let them know before we make any changes to their accounts.
Customers included in these changes will be notified on May 22.
Notifications they receive will include a personalized link with details about price changes.
Account memos will be updated for included customers by the end of day May 22.
Changes will be reflected in their June bill
Assist customers with any questions they have about their accounts.
Review the MRC Updates One Stop Shop for more information.
According to sources, the company shared in a call at 8am Eastern that the price increase was necessary “due to inflation”. The company has kept the news extremely tight, but as we shared previously, the signs were there of something big coming.
T-Mobile is stressing to employees to stick to the script, and do not deviate.
Employees have been told to stay very staffed through this week, and managers are required to be on-hand for entire shifts all week.
We’re also told management is already using the situation to push sales. One rep we spoke to shared a message from management saying that if a customer calls in to complain, use it as an opportunity to offer to upgrade them to newer plans.
Options available to customers
If you’re impacted by the price increases, you have two options.
The first is to accept the increase. If the increase of $2-$5 per line per month is acceptable to you, and you think T-Mobile’s service is worth the new cost, stick with it! There are many benefits to staying with the company, especially if they’re working perfectly for you and you don’t want to go through the hassle of changing carriers. It’s very possible that even with the price increase you’ll be saving money over the competition.
That being said, the second option is to leave T-Mobile. The company is theoretically bound by their Price Lock guarantee on most plans, so if you’re on an eligible plan, you can leave the company and request they pay your final T-Mobile bill for you.
