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T-Mobile Closes Sprint Merger after Two-Year Battle:
Two years after announcing a $26.5 billion merger with Sprint, T-Mobile is ready to get to work integrating the two companies. On Wednesday, the carrier announced that it has closed the deal, which will allow it to begin combining the third- and fourth-largest US wireless providers.
Both companies claim the merger will let them better compete with industry giants Verizon and AT&T. The move will see T-Mobile divest Sprint's Boost prepaid brand and spectrum to Dish, which will enter the market as a new fourth carrier. Dish, led by Charlie Ergen, has spent years and billions of dollars accumulating its own wireless spectrum and was previously under a deadline imposed by the Federal Communications Commission to put some of its spectrum trove to use by March of this year or risk losing it.
[...] These moves will potentially remake how Americans will get their wireless service over the coming years. T-Mobile and Sprint's combined assets should supercharge their ambitions to roll out 5G across the country, and the merged company's larger presence should enable it to better compete against larger rivals Verizon Wireless and AT&T. Dish, meanwhile, represents a new low-cost alternative once it gets its service rolled out.
Also at: Ars Technica.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 02 2020, @12:42AM (3 children)
I was on the discontinued t-mobile $30/mo 5GB data "Wallmart" plan until a few months ago. Switched to Mint. 3GB + unlimited voice/text $15/mo. Bump data to 8G, $20/mo. 12G, $25/mo. Mint uses t-mobile towers, etc. So, if you had coverage with t-mobile, you will with Mint, too. You will need a carrier unlocked phone compatible with t-mobile's network https://www.frequencycheck.com/carriers/t-mobile-united-states [frequencycheck.com] Some of the LTE bands used by t-mobile are a bit unique for the U.S., and you will probably be sad without them, if you travel a lot (some areas have only voice over lte coverage, so even voice calls rely on these lte bands).
You have to pre-pay for a year to get the prices above. But, they almost always have a special going on for new subscribers where you can get 3 months for the same monthly price as if you paid for a full year. Sometimes sweetened further, by making the higher data tiers the same price as the lowest tier for this new user special.
If you run out of data, you either get *super slow* speeds (128kbps), or can buy 1GB or 3GB extra data for the month but it is very expensive.
As with any MVNO, your traffic can be de-prioritized by the real carrier, when the real carrier needs capacity for its direct customers, but I haven't noticed much difference (but, I live in a semi-rural area). There was a week where my data rates were pretty slow, but it hasn't happened since (and I have no way to know if t-mobile customers were not affected too).
If you know someone already on Mint, ask them for their "refer a friend" affiliate link, so each of you can get $15 off. Your friend might even have an intro sim kit with a week worth of voice, and 250MB data they can give you (they sent me one of these when they sent me my regular sim).
affiliate link (we each get $15 off): http://fbuy.me/o1DtY [fbuy.me]
non-affiliate direct link: https://www.mintmobile.com/ [mintmobile.com]
If the affiliate link is against the rules, please mod this post to oblivion :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 02 2020, @05:48PM
I forgot to mention...
You might want to use a fake name with Mint. To port your number from Mint to a different carrier, all that is needed is your name and your phone number. Your PIN is your phone number, and cannot be changed. Pretty crazy, when sim swap attacks are so common these days.
I used a fake name, and put it in my password database.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 04 2020, @12:32AM
In case anybody was wondering, zero uses of the referral link. (same AC as parent)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 04 2020, @12:51AM
Just renewed plan after intro 3 mo. plan.
The 3GB/mo plan is really 16.67/mo after all their bullshit fees. Still cheaper than alternatives (that I've found, anyway), but I dislike dishonest pricing.