T-Mobile USA Launches Never Settle Trial For Verizon Customers
by Brandon Chester on May 5, 2015 1:09 AM EST
T-Mobile has become a very different company under CEO John Legere. Since his appointment in 2012, T-Mobile has gone through several phases of their Uncarrier campaigns which aim to differentiate them from Sprint, AT&T, and Verizon. Both he and their advertising campaigns are not afraid to directly attack other carriers in the United States for policies that have long been dreaded by consumers.
Today they launched a new campaign targeted at Verizon users in the United States. The campaign pokes fun at the "Never Settle" tagline and #NeverSettle hashtag that Verizon has been using in their recent ad campaign to promote their LTE network. T-Mobile's new Twitter hashtag for their campaign is #NeverSettleforVerizon, and the Never Settle Trial is a free trial of T-Mobile's service that current Verizon customers can sign up for.
The Never Settle trial will begin on May 13, and it will work as follows. Verizon users will port their number to T-Mobile for the trial period, but hold on to their current Verizon phone. If the user was happy with their service on T-Mobile then T-Mobile will cover their Verizon Early Termination Fee (ETF) and remaining device subsidy up to a maximum of $650 when they trade in their existing Verizon phone and sign up for one of T-Mobile's plans. If they were unhappy with the service, they can port back to Verizon and T-Mobile will cover their activation fees by sending them a prepaid Visa card for that amount, and they will also waive cost of their service while on T-Mobile.
I would assume the system is such that you keep your Verizon line during the duration of the trial, and when you port your number to T-Mobile a new number gets assigned to your Verizon account until you either leave or port back. I know on my carrier in Canada a number port request usually goes along with an account closure, so hopefully T-Mobile has planned all this out.
T-Mobile has made eight videos to promote this new campaign, and you can check those out in the source below.
Source: T-Mobile
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Wardrop - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
I thought this was going to be some kind of teaming up of T-Mobile and OnePlus.bigboxes - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
Tell us more, Chuckles.DanNeely - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
I don't need to test port my phone to TMobile to know I'd never settle for a carrier that only offers 2g speeds where I live.Drumsticks - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
Obviously there are a lot of customers that this wouldn't work for. For all its faults as a company, verizon has great coverage. But there's also probably thousands to millions in overlapping service areas who could save a lot of money.Reflex - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
My brother switched his family from VZ to TMo last November to save money. It did save him money, but last night he was begging me to let him on my VZ plan as soon as their obligations with TMo are up. He says the drop off in coverage, speeds and customer service were enormous, and the phone selection is weak unless you are on iOS. He hates dropping calls every time he goes down I5 from Seattle to Portland where there is a massive cell hole pretty much from Olympia to Kelso.Basically after having service that just worked, everywhere, with top end phones for iOS/WP/Android available it was just too big a downgrade to be worth the savings, which did not turn out to be as substantial as their online tool made them out to be.
He'll be back. I kind of suspect there are a lot more like him out there realizing that you get what you pay for. Unless TMo takes some of the money they are making off switchers and invests in their network and handsets I have a feeling their recent rise will be temporary.
Smudgeous - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
Interestingly enough, I had pretty much the opposite experience when switching from Verizon to T-Mobile. Substantially faster/more reliable LTE, wireless coverage in some previous deadzones at work, better phone selection, and higher data limits. To top it all off, I seem to get emails every few months with a notification of something new they decided to roll out at no cost (streaming music not counting toward monthly limits, data rollover, etc). In reference to "you get what you pay for", I wasn't getting anything but a thinner wallet from Verizon despite having been a long-standing loyal customer.Reflex - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
To some degree its regional, I'm certain there are some areas where TMo has better and faster coverage. Generally speaking, however, VZ has a much larger coverage area than TMo. I have driven across the country multiple times from Seattle to Michigan and DC, I have found exactly one town in the northern Rockies where I had no VZ coverage (according to someone in that city no major carriers served them). By comparison non-VZ traveling companions have had frequent cell holes that often last for hundreds of miles.I'm sorry VZ didn't work out for you, I'm sure there are a number of edge cases like that. Hopefully at some point that changes as competition is a good thing. I know I certainly wish TMo was competitive here in the northwest, I'd like to have better options.
A5 - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
I would never, ever buy a non-iOS device on Verizon. They're always last to approve Android updates.Reflex - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
They have been pretty good with Windows Phone, however, which is what I use. Furthermore, MS has a developer program that lets me skip the waiting so even though the Icon update was delayed way longer than it should have been, I didn't have to wait for 8.1. My previous WP devices were all updated within 3 months of a release however.sprockkets - Wednesday, May 6, 2015 - link
The dev program is in no way a proper substitute for proper lumia updates, as others can attest too.