Quote:
Originally Posted by ashma
I too would have paid 700 or 800 for this device (even though I now know that this summer might see me testing and considering the HTC EVO). But you have to remember that saving $50.00 on any type of purchase is something many people would be thrilled to and perhaps need to do.
BTW' I just heard from an unhappy friend who says she's is on Flex-Pay and there for RadioShack will be charging her $249.99 rather than the 149.99 price. WTF! That just seems wrong to me but perhaps I don't know the business structure behind it.
Anyhow, my RadioShack opens at 9:00 a.m. so you know where I'll be. I also called ahead and they said that they can go ahead and special order a 2nd standard battery for me which I might as well do since I'm using a gift card. Ordering the standard battery because I do not want the extra thickness of the extended. Down to hours rather than days; simply wonderful.........
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there is a tiered pricing structure behind every single wireless transaction. the reason business such as radioshack or any other third party dealer sell phones is because for each transaction processed results in Tmobile/ATT/Verizon/Sprint paying $XXX to the company depending on what the transaction was
for example,
RSH gets paid more for a new activation than we do for an upgrade, and we can get paid more for adding features, messaging/web/navigation/tv etc because the more money the carrier makes, the more they pay the dealer
Now I don't know any exact figures but this results in our tiered pricing structure, radioshack is willing to let more money go on a phone if it drives new activation business because we'll make more money on the back end anyway versus an upgrade we won't get paid as much so in some cases (such as the HD2) the upgrade price on the hardware is higher
now the problem with Tmobile is they have so many ifs ands or buts that the structure gets kind of muddled, no i don't know for sure if this is the case but here's what i'm going to assume:
flexpay is basically prepaid service agreement with postpaid service rates, pay at the beginning of the month but get a decent rate plan and even a discount on the phone if you sign a contract now, flexpay is generally (very generally i'm not trying to make a statement about your specific friend) used to get people with poor credit onto a rate plan worth having, its also useful for those that dont want to run the risk of overages, since its prepaid you can't have an overage charge
now between it being prepaid, and typically with those with poor credit scores tmobile is probably expecting payments on these to stop at any moment they're probably paying out less to the dealers because Tmobile is banking on not making as much money, this in turn affects radioshack's pricing structure, they're not making as much money so they're not going to let as much go on the hardware
I know its an unpleasant situation but that's likely what is happening
I know that was a lot but I hope its helpful