I understand sprint is loosing money on the sero plans. if we bought EVO, Nexus1...

[teddat]

I understand sprint is loosing money on the sero plans. if we bought the EVO, Nexus1... outright. 529 for Nexus one. even 599 or 649 for Evo. i'd pay it just to keep my 30$ plan.

of course they would lose money if they had to subsidize the phone for $179, 199, 299 for a 2 year contract.

can they really prevent me from registering the phone with the sero plan if i bought the phone(s) outright??

[sebo]

Originally Posted by teddat

can they really prevent me from registering the phone with the sero plan if i bought the phone(s) outright??

yes they can... most likely the Evo is going to require an "everything" plan.

i have a 10 yr old unlimited plan (not sero) includes unlimited data, unlimited sms, unlimited mobile-to-mobile, etc. and i pay $80 a month.

technically there is no difference between my 10yr old plan and the new "everything unlimited" plan except the new plan cost more.. but in sprint's eye's i need a new plan.

it sucks but not much you can do about it, except upgrade to a new plan and pay more or cancel..

[teddat]

thx for your response. Im just wondering if its worth it to them to potentially lose their Sero customers. It might be red ink to them. but not if we bought the phones outright. they don't have to subsidize the plans if we do that.

if we can buy a CDMA winmo, blackberry, phone and use on sero, why not android. is this a new under the table bullying tactic to get their loyal OLD customers to sign up to new plans? i think its hitting below the belt especially if we buy a nexus one from google and just want to use the phone on our existing plans.

can they really prevent us from using the phones on the network? ESN is different on say a winmo phone than a android?

might be a lost cause but im just running through some theoreticals...

[gTen]

Originally Posted by teddat

thx for your response. Im just wondering if its worth it to them to potentially lose their Sero customers. It might be red ink to them. but not if we bought the phones outright. they don't have to subsidize the plans if we do that.

if we can buy a CDMA winmo, blackberry, phone and use on sero, why not android. is this a new under the table bullying tactic to get their loyal OLD customers to sign up to new plans? i think its hitting below the belt especially if we buy a nexus one from google and just want to use the phone on our existing plans.

can they really prevent us from using the phones on the network? ESN is different on say a winmo phone than a android?

might be a lost cause but im just running through some theoreticals...

Actually sprint is not loosing money on SERO people..they just aren't making as much as they'd want to off them.for every sero person they can get off the plan they get double from that person.

Now here is what sucks about US CDMA, the carriers pretty much are the only ones you can get the phone for..and they got a ESN Table with all the devices registered. When you try to input the ESN it will automatically say it is not compatible with your plan.

They want ppl to buy the phones with upgrade because then it locks them into a 2 year contract..a 150$ upgrade is easily worth locking someone in for sprint.

There is a small possibility the nexus one will be an exception due to google doing the activation though..

[sebo]

the system knows what type of phone it is based on ESN number, so even if you do manage to get your hands on an Evo when you try to swap it into your line the system will trigger a message alerting that plan change is required. i am not positive this will be the case with the Evo, but i don't think ANY of the current Andriod phones are allowed on legacy plans.

i agree, it would be nice if legacy plans customer had the option to buy the phone at full price to be used on older plans but sadly sprint is holding their ground and not allowing any of the Andriods on the network with old plans.

i guess the only way to find out if sprint wants to keep legacy customers is to threaten to cancel, but be prepared to do just that if you don't get your way.. i assume if you are a long time customer (more just a couple years) it may help your case.. however, being on a sero plan doesn't give you much leverage though imo.

it's just a tactic sprint is using to move people away from older plans to try and make more money by getting them to change plans.. i do think it's back firing on them and every year they lose thousands of customers, but they don't seem to care.

when the palm pre was released there were thousands of angry customers that couldn't use their plan.. sprint held their ground and to this day legacy plans weren't allowed to use the Palm pre. sadly, i think the palm failed on sprint because of this. sales would have sky rocketed had they let legacy users buy the phone.

so again, that just shows that they don't really care about old/legacy customers. in reality it's the old customers on legacy plans keeping them in business.. the ROI isn't great when a new customer joins and 2 yrs later switches providers. it's the oldies that keep paying their bills on time every month where sprint makes their money. it's too bad sprint doesn't see things our way.

good luck.

[gTen]

The problem with the SERO plan and my guess some older plans is they were contracted by 3rd parties..so even if sprint wanted to get rid of the SERO people they can't unless you leave out of yourself.

[p-slim]

Sero is not a 3rd party plan, you can and were only able to get it from the sprint website, and to access that website you need a sprint employee address. For awhile we were allowed to set them up in the stores but 3rd parties were never allowed to sell sero.

As for the op, yes sprint is willing to lose sero users. Obviously sero users are still on it because they want the cheapest plan, Sprint by far has the cheapest plans even killing tmobile, so if you're going to leave sprint because you're mad about your plan, you're hurting yourself more by going to any other company except metro.

[p-slim]

Originally Posted by sebo

the system knows what type of phone it is based on ESN number, so even if you do manage to get your hands on an Evo when you try to swap it into your line the system will trigger a message alerting that plan change is required. i am not positive this will be the case with the Evo, but i don't think ANY of the current Andriod phones are allowed on legacy plans.

i agree, it would be nice if legacy plans customer had the option to buy the phone at full price to be used on older plans but sadly sprint is holding their ground and not allowing any of the Andriods on the network with old plans.

i guess the only way to find out if sprint wants to keep legacy customers is to threaten to cancel, but be prepared to do just that if you don't get your way.. i assume if you are a long time customer (more just a couple years) it may help your case.. however, being on a sero plan doesn't give you much leverage though imo.

it's just a tactic sprint is using to move people away from older plans to try and make more money by getting them to change plans.. i do think it's back firing on them and every year they lose thousands of customers, but they don't seem to care.

when the palm pre was released there were thousands of angry customers that couldn't use their plan.. sprint held their ground and to this day legacy plans weren't allowed to use the Palm pre. sadly, i think the palm failed on sprint because of this. sales would have sky rocketed had they let legacy users buy the phone.

so again, that just shows that they don't really care about old/legacy customers. in reality it's the old customers on legacy plans keeping them in business.. the ROI isn't great when a new customer joins and 2 yrs later switches providers. it's the oldies that keep paying their bills on time every month where sprint makes their money. it's too bad sprint doesn't see things our way.

good luck.

You're wrong. sprint isn't making a dime off sero users. its funny you think those 29.99 plans are whats keeping sprint alive. if that was the case why not just make all plans that price, they would kill the market. They are still the top 3 provider and the only reason att is up there is because of the iphone, that simple.

[teddat]

ya if not evo 4g on 59-69.99 a month. i'll be perfectly happy with nexus one on $30 a month. over 2 years that's atleast $720

crossing fingers. i'm not asking sprint to lose money just don't ignore their long time loyal customers even if they have legacy plans...

[sebo]

Originally Posted by p-slim

You're wrong. sprint isn't making a dime off sero users. its funny you think those 29.99 plans are whats keeping sprint alive. if that was the case why not just make all plans that price, they would kill the market. They are still the top 3 provider and the only reason att is up there is because of the iphone, that simple.

re-read again, im not specifically referring to sero customers, there are millions of people on other legacy plans like myself. its a fact there are more customers on older plans than there are on these newly introduced "everything" plan.

so are they losing money on those customers too? No, it's just a way to make more money off them by forcing them to upgrade to a "newer" plan.

anyway, im not really complaining here, just giving the OP some input..