T-Mobile Rolls Out $40 Prepaid Plan

Wireless carrier T-Mobile just won’t stop pushing deeper into discounted smartphone plans. As industry competition heats up, the company made a bold move to maintain its leading position in the prepaid wireless sector with Simply Prepaid. The U.S’ fourth-largest wireless carrier, which calls itself the “un-carrier,” is delivering unlimited data, talk and text with 4G LTE data buckets for its prepaid plan holders. The costs start at $40 a month.
“There’s a reason the un-carrier continues to be #1 in prepaid, and it starts with our willingness to break the rules and give customers better choices,” said John Legere, president and CEO for T-Mobile. “We will never stop eliminating customer pain points. The 1.2 million net new prepaid customers who joined T-Mobile last year already see that value, and we have no plans to stop there.”
What Will It Cost You?
With its Simply Prepaid plan, T-Mobile is taking a page from its post-paid playbook. T-Mobile’s Simple Choice Plan shook up the industry and forced AT&T, Verizon and Sprint to respond. Simply Prepaid doesn’t offer quite the breadth of service as on the pre-paid side, but the price is lower and it still offers 4G LTE connectivity.
Here’s the pricing breakdown: $40 a month for unlimited data, talk and text, plus up to 1 GB of 4G LTE; $50 a month for unlimited data, talk and text, plus up to 3 GB of 4G LTE; or $60 a month for unlimited data, talk and text, plus up to 5 GB of 4G LTE. Simply Prepaid customers can also tap into free Wi-Fi calling and download a song in under 10 seconds or a 30-minute HDTV show in just eight minutes with speeds up to 8 Mbps.
The Simply Prepaid plan could woo even more wireless consumers to T-Mobile’s corner. As Legere noted, the company won the hearts and wallets of 1.2 million net consumers with its pre-paid business in 2014. That gave it a strong lead over its behemoth competitors stateside. The new plan comes online January 25.
What’s the Best Choice?
We turned to Jeff Kagan, an independent technology analyst, to get his thoughts on T-Mobile’s latest market move. He told us the company continues to reinvent itself with offers that cost the customer less. This is good, but it’s not exactly a breakthrough, he said.
“There is nothing here that every other carrier does not already offer. The only real difference is the price,” Kagan said. “There are two big areas where wireless carriers compete today. Either carriers offer the most expansive and fastest network connection at a higher price, or they offer a lower price with less network coverage and speed.”
Kagan said customers have to make this decision based on what best suits their needs -- and there is no right or wrong answer for everyone. As he sees it, the new T-Mobile offering is attractive to one group of the customer pie, but it won't change the wireless marketplace in any way.
“This is just T-Mobile giving customers a reason to by from them rather than going to AT&T Mobility, Verizon Wireless or Sprint,” Kagan said. “The wireless marketplace is transforming to a place where customers have a real choice. They can choose whatever is most important to them.”