December 18th, 2008
T-Mobile drops $18 upgrade fee, will other carriers follow suit?
When I purchased my T-Mobile G1 a couple of months ago an $18 upgrade fee was applied. This same fee was applied when I bought an HTC Fuze from AT&T just last month too. I’ve never seen a way to get out of paying this fee and this fee made absolutely no sense to me and is just a way for the carrier to stick you with more unnecessary fees. If you are upgrading your handset, then you are already paying them a bit of money for a new device and more than likely people are adding services like data, text messages, and more that are supported on the newer device. I was pleased to receive an email this morning that T-Mobile is eliminating this $18 upgrade fee across-the-board and across all channels (retail, online, etc.).
I hope that this causes all the other U.S. wireless carriers to follow suit, which happens a lot when one company sets the bar. Can anyone tell my why this fee is even necessary?
Matthew Miller is an avid mobile device enthusiast who works during the day as a professional naval architect in Seattle. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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| 12/19/08
