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Boost takes swipe at MetroPCS' international calling plan
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Taking aim at rival MetroPCS, a Boost Mobile executive called MetroPCS' recently introduced international unlimited calling plan "impossible" and urged customers to take a look at the fine print.
MetroPCS last week unveiled a plan that offers unlimited international calling to more than 100 countries for $5 per month. The carrier said subscribers will be able to call more than 1,000 destinations and the feature can be added to its $40, $45 and $50 monthly service plans, including family plans. Boost Mobile, Sprint Netxel's prepaid unit, has countered that the offer is simply too good to be true.
"Anything can be profitable depending on the usage," Justin Brennan, Boost Mobile's director of prepaid business, told the OC Register. "They're obviously taking a bet on the usage. ... They're betting customers won't use it very much." Brennan said perhaps MetroPCS would force customers to upgrade to more expensive plans, or tack on taxes and fees. MetroPCS also faces settlement fees from other carriers, which vary but are generally part of the international calling business.
"We really have seen some seemingly impossible offers like this come from MetroPCS before and what happens is they disappear very quickly, which make it seem that it is too good to be true," Brennan said.
MetroPCS declined to respond directly. "We don't disclose pricing or profitability on individual products," the carrier said in a statement, according to the Register. "However, our company is extremely profitable even with the launching of new markets and we have some of the lowest operating costs in the industry." MetroPCS did not respond to further requests for comment at deadline.
For more:
- see this OC Register article
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Comments
Posted by Anonymous | June 30, 2009 - 3:26pm
Maybe Boost should focus on building a good network instead of relying on an old outdated Nextel IDEN platfom that doesn't even get up to date software fixes. Once Boost loads more customers the network will start to fail. Don't forget Boost is managed by SPrint PCS who is losing millions of customers a year. You think they have the capital to keep building or updating. Sprint and Boost are on the way out. As a matter of fact this is Boost's relaunch. They tried last year and got laughed out.
Posted by Galinko Ivsky | July 1, 2009 - 7:22pm
Amazing. Who is this Brennan guy? Just going on record with random allegations. Boost is a marketing company - call me when you become a carrier. MetroPCS has built its network and is far from a marketing concept.
Posted by A METRO PCS CUSTOMER | July 19, 2009 - 6:31pm
MetroPCS started the unlimited international calling to 100 contries for $5, just in the June end.
When I enabled the service all mobile phones / landlines phone of my Country were under the
unlimited plan.
Now just after 20 days, Mobile phones of my country are taken out of this unilimited plan.
And yes of course legelly they have mentioned on their Number lookup site that whatever
numbers are available now might go out of the plan -
It will happen this soon - Thats a surprise.
So partly the offer was too good to be true :-)
Posted by patek celeng | July 29, 2009 - 1:00pm
Boost need more selection of the phone and big sreenand look what public like it, belive or not boost will be number one in the market. Bid the metro pcs !
Posted by ANGRY METRO CUSTOMER | November 17, 2009 - 8:33am
I JUST got the plan because I thought I could ring Scotland-WTF?!! I can ring AFRICA but NOT Scotland?! URGH!
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