Less than a week into what is traditionally the busiest quarter of the year, Sprint PCS rolled out a handful of modest rate plan changes bolstering the carrier’s low-end and mid-priced offerings and providing more competitive price-per-minute rates as the industry prepares for the holiday selling season.
Sprint PCS’ rate plan changes include the addition of unlimited night and weekend calling minutes to its entry-level $35 per month for 300 anytime calling minutes plan. Previously Sprint offered 1,000 night and weekend calling minutes. While the change does not affect the anytime price per minute of the plan, the unlimited night and weekend upgrade matches similar low-end offerings from AT&T Wireless Services Inc. and T-Mobile USA Inc.
More dramatic changes were made to Sprint PCS’ mid-priced plans, including the addition of a $50 plan. The new $50 plan includes 700 anytime calling minutes as well as unlimited night and weekend calling and could be an appealing upgrade from its $45 for 500 anytime-calling-minute plan. The $50 plan also matches AT&T Wireless’ and Cingular Wireless L.L.C.’s nationwide on-network plans and undercuts Verizon Wireless, which offers only 500 anytime calling minutes at the $50 price point.
Further up the scale, Sprint PCS replaced its $60 per month for 800 anytime calling minutes offering with a $65 per month for 1,100 anytime minutes plan, which cuts the price per minute from 7.5 cents per minute to 5.9 cents per minute.
Sprint PCS also added 300 additional anytime calling minutes for a total of 1,400 anytime minutes to its $80 per month plan, cutting the price-per-minute charge from 7.3 cents per minute to 5.7 cents per minute.
Sprint PCS made several similar price adjustments in early July, reducing the price for 800 anytime calling minutes from $65 per month to $60 and adding 100 additional anytime minutes to its $80 price plan, which reduced the plans price per minute from 8 cents to 7.3 cents.
Analysts were not concerned about the changes, noting the new prices were not severely undercutting the competition and in most cases were matching already-established price points. Sprint PCS also made the most aggressive changes to its more-than-$60 plans. If those plans prove appealing, they could bolster the carrier’s approximately $60 average revenue per user metric.
Others were more interested in Sprint PCS’ adjustments to its Add-a-Phone option, noting the carrier had doubled the options price on its $100 and higher rate plans from $10 per month to $20 per month. The increase was somewhat mitigated because the carrier includes unlimited PCS-to-PCS calling with a two-year contract, which was previously an additional $5 per month.
The increase in adding a line of service was counter to recent changes by GSM-based carriers, which have reduced the option to $10 per month.
