With another round of news, the growing mobile and home phone service provider – T-Mobile – has made it to the headlines, again.
According to the T-Mobile, the company has incurred certain losses in the past and is carrying them forward till the present day. Thus, to recover from these losses, T-Mobile has decided to increase some monthly customer fees, the next month.
The Announcement
The mobile and prepaid phone service provider made an announcement recently, to increase certain monthly fee charges for its customers. The increase in the fees is going to affect a number of T-Mobile customers.
With effect from 10th June 2017, a few select T-Mobile accounts will face an increase in the Regulatory Programs & Telco Recovery Fee.
The increase in the fee would be from $2.71 to $3.18 for the voice lines and from $0.98 t0 $1.16 for the data lines.
The customers using the T-Mobile ONE Taxes & Fees Included plan are, however, unaffected by this change. But all other customers of the prepaid phone service provider, come in the loop.
As per T-Mobile, the former customers of the SunCom Wireless were exempted from this fee but now, with the increase in the fee, these customers are also going to pay it. It is only if they’re not using the T-Mobile ONE Taxes & Fees Included plan.
SunCom is a wireless carrier based in Pennsylvania that was acquired by T-Mobile in 2008 for an amount of $1.6 billion.
According to T-Mobile, a growing mobile and home phone service provider, the changes in the fee structure for its services are based on the cost structure of its third-party services and that of the government program compliance. The changes are said to be a part of T-Mobile’s standard price adjustments.
The company said that it regularly reviews the related compliance costs of its services and adjusts the customer fees in accordance with these changes, charging the customers accurately as per their choice of plan.
The T-Mobile officials said, “This is not a government tax, rather a fee collected and retained by T-Mobile to help recover certain costs we have already incurred and continue to incur. It includes: 1) Funding and complying with government mandates, programs, and obligations, like E911 or local number portability ($0.60 of the total charge for voice lines and $0.15 for data only lines), and 2) Charges imposed on T-Mobile by other carriers for the delivery of calls from our customers to theirs, and by third parties for certain network facilities and services we purchase to provide you with service (Up until 6/10/2017, it will be $2.11 of the total charge for voice lines or $0.83 for data only lines; From 6/10/2017 on it will be $2.58 of the total charge for voice lines or $1.01 for data only lines).”
Thus, the increase in the customer fee by the home phone and prepaid phone service provider must not be mistaken for the government taxes or fees as the money is to be retained by the service provider, itself.
In a Nutshell
T-Mobile has planned to increase certain monthly fees for its customers, implementing from June 10. The idea behind such increase in the customer fees is to make up for the losses being continuously incurred by the mobile and home phone service provider.
A number of customers will be affected by this change, except for the ones that have opted for the T-Mobile ONE Taxes & Fees Included plan. So, we’re to see if T-Mobile has made its way to healing from the previous losses or to incur more of them.