{"id":493,"date":"2014-12-22T01:03:00","date_gmt":"2014-12-22T05:03:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/?p=493"},"modified":"2014-12-22T08:14:59","modified_gmt":"2014-12-22T12:14:59","slug":"my-switch-to-t-mobile-a-few-things-you-may-want-to-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/?p=493","title":{"rendered":"My Switch to T-Mobile. A few things you may want to know."},"content":{"rendered":"

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I have been an AT&T customer for a long time. \u00a0A really long time. \u00a0Let me first say that my move to T-Mobile had nothing to do with a problem or deficiency with AT&T. \u00a0Loved them, still do. \u00a0Service was second to none. \u00a0Now thats out of the way lets move on.<\/p>\n

The AT&T family plan that I was on was affordable but if I were to upgrade phones\/devices then my plan pricing would have skyrocketed. \u00a0I have 7 lines on my plan and everything starts to add up. \u00a0I was sitting at about $255 month for AT&T but heres the thing. \u00a0For every phone I upgraded there would be an upgrade fee ($99, $150 or whatever) and then a monthly charge for that upgraded line of like $25 or $35 dollars per month. \u00a0I had four iPhone 4s’s, one iPhone 5C and two iPhone 5’s. \u00a0So upgrading all the devices would have added $200 per month or more. \u00a0Basically unless I purchased my phones outright then my plan pricing was going to be in the high $400’s at least.<\/p>\n

I had always discounted T-Mobile. \u00a0I assumed it was a struggling 3rd place wanna be carrier that was using gimmicks to lure customers away from their current carriers. \u00a0The more I read about them the more I became intrigued. \u00a0T-Mobile in the last couple of years has been making a march on their service increasing speeds and overall coverage. \u00a0No they aren’t as good as AT&T or Verizon (yet) but keep reading before you judge. \u00a0I will give you the rundown in just a minute.<\/p>\n

This all started because I wanted an iPhone 6 plus. \u00a0So I started crunching numbers. \u00a0Here is how T-Mobile is set up. \u00a0Family plan $100\/month includes 4 phone lines at a level of 2.5gb of data per line for the first year. \u00a0Not sure what happens in year two. \u00a0Think data probably drops back to 1.0gb with the option to upgrade but the family plan price is guaranteed not to change. \u00a0Each line after the four comes at a $10\/month additional charge. \u00a0The data is handled differently than Verizon and AT&T. \u00a0Its per line and not a family “bucket” of data. \u00a0There are both advantages and disadvantages to this. \u00a0Advantage, when I need more data I can pick the actual line that needs it. \u00a0Something very cool is that T-Mobile does not count music streaming as data usage so Spotify, Pandora, 8 tracks and quite a few other music streaming sites can run all day and not cost you data. \u00a0Another cool feature is that its teen proof in that if they run over their data limit T-Mobile doesn’t charge you more, they just throttle the data hungry user back to 3g speeds. \u00a0I think T-Mobile is also starting a data roll over program where your unused data from the month before gets pushed to the next month. \u00a0Cool!<\/p>\n

Back to pricing… $100 for first four lines, $10 per for the next three lines (remember I have 7) so $130\/month for 7 lines. \u00a0Each line has 2.5gb data and unlimited text and talk and free music channels for streaming. \u00a0Not too shabby. \u00a0Wait, I still have old phones! \u00a0Upgrading and purchasing phones is fairly cool as well at T-Mobile. \u00a0T-Mobile sells you the phone at full retail and takes the price and streams the amount into 24 equal, no interest payments over the next two years. \u00a0You pay zero down on certain versions of phones…IF…you have excellent credit. \u00a0I do, so no worries with this. \u00a0Its not zero down for every phone. \u00a0The more upgraded\/features the phone has the more up front money they require but what ever you give them up front comes off the price of the phone and its payments. \u00a0You always get what you pay for. \u00a0Its fair. \u00a0After two years your phone is paid off, its yours and you can upgrade or buy another and sell your old one on eBay. \u00a0Nice thing is you don’t have to pay that upgrade fee like AT&T and then pay off the phone too! \u00a0The big boys are double dipping. \u00a0This chart shows the breakdown of the iPhone 6’s and the upfront and monthly fees.<\/p>\n

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Pricing…$100 first four lines, $30 for three more lines, I bought four iPhone 6’s and on one iPhone 6 plus so $140 per month for these. \u00a0I increased my personal data to 4.5gb \u00a0at $10 a month and picked up insurance on the iPhone 6 plus with early upgrade option for another $10 a month. \u00a0Grand total with tax I roll in at about $300 per month for seven lines and five have been upgraded. \u00a0I am only $45 dollars more than with AT&T. \u00a0Yes, its more but AT&T with the same phones…$480 or more. \u00a0They also offer some buy outs and trade ins for your various equipment and current service. \u00a0Don’t be fooled there will be some out of pocket expenses cleaning up your old phone account and getting things on track at T-Mobile but it will all come out in the wash in the end.<\/p>\n

How is the service? \u00a0Pretty darn good. \u00a0 Not bad at all. \u00a0I live in Northern Virginia outside of DC so I have very good coverage. \u00a0This is something you will want to be careful with. \u00a0If you live in a rural area and T-Mobile service is sketchy then stick with your current carrier. \u00a0I get 3-4 bars of 4G LTE in most places near me. \u00a0I even ran a few speed tests with my buddy and in some tests I bested his Verizon speeds. \u00a0When you get T-Mobile LTE its fast. \u00a0When you don’t, you just don’t. \u00a0I traveled from DC to North Carolina (rt-66 to rt-81- to rt-77) and two thirds of the trip I was without data. \u00a0I could always make a phone call but data was in and out. \u00a0One feature to note is that T-Mobile phones have the ability for wifi calling. \u00a0That means that if you’re in a location and you have wifi then you can make calls through the internet on the network. \u00a0This is good because lets say when you’re home your service is weak. \u00a0Well, in the house once wifi kicks on your phone you’re good to go. \u00a0I tested and converted only my personal line to T-Mobile for the first month. \u00a0I was able to test the service and fortunately it worked out. \u00a0I would suggest trying before buying to make sure you’re ok with the service before jumping in both feet. \u00a0I expect the service to only get better in the next two years.<\/p>\n

Lets talk people. \u00a0Fairly impressed so far. \u00a0The retail staff seems very competent and the call in phone support is always very knowledgeable and courteous. \u00a0I had a problem finding an iPhone 6 plus and one of the support managers went out of his way to chase one down and called me back two hours after the call and let me know he overnighted the phone to me for FREE! \u00a0Two thumbs up for that kind of service. \u00a0Verizon isn’t even in the club. \u00a0Sorry, everyone knows its true.<\/p>\n

I must say that so far I am fairly happy. \u00a0Out of 5 stars I would give T-Mobile a strong 4.0. \u00a0Pricing is great, service is great but I would take away 1 point just to be objective and say that the service when not LTE is not great and I had a tough time finding iPhones but that may totally have been an Apple issue and not T-Mobiles fault. \u00a0Give T-Mobile a look. \u00a0They might be a good choice for you. \u00a0Do your homework first but I can honestly say so far so good.<\/p>\n

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  I have been an AT&T customer for a long time. \u00a0A really long time. \u00a0Let me first say that my move to T-Mobile had nothing to do with a problem or deficiency with AT&T. \u00a0Loved them, still do. \u00a0Service was second to none. \u00a0Now thats out of the way lets move on. The AT&T family plan that I was on was affordable but if I were to upgrade phones\/devices then my plan pricing would have skyrocketed. \u00a0I have 7 lines on my plan and everything starts to add up. \u00a0I was sitting at about $255 month for AT&T but heres the thing. \u00a0For every phone I upgraded there would be an upgrade fee ($99, $150 or whatever) and then a monthly charge for that upgraded line of like $25 or $35 dollars per month. \u00a0I had four iPhone 4s’s, one iPhone 5C and two iPhone 5’s. \u00a0So upgrading all the devices would have added $200 per month or more. \u00a0Basically unless I purchased my phones outright then my plan pricing was going to be in the high $400’s at least. I had always discounted T-Mobile. \u00a0I assumed it was a struggling 3rd place wanna be carrier that was using \u2026 Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":495,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/yourtypicalguy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/TMobileLogoWhite.jpg?fit=1800%2C594","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3RysV-7X","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=493"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":499,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493\/revisions\/499"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourtypicalguy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}