OKLAHOMA CITY—Dobson Communications Corp. released positive preliminary customer numbers for its most recent quarter as well as an 18 percent improvement in its churn rate compared with the same period last year.
Dobson said it expects to report full financial results on Aug. 8, but its initial numbers reflected 17,300 net customer additions, including 13,800 postpaid subscribers, 7,700 prepaid customers and a loss of 4,200 reseller customers. Those numbers do not include about 500 users acquired along with wireless assets from the Texas 15 Rural Service Area, which Dobson closed on late last month. The numbers put Dobson in positive territory for subscriber adds, a reverse of the net loss of about 1,100 subscribers it reported in the second quarter of last year.
The company’s gross additions during the quarter were down about 3,400 subscribers from the 131,500 gross adds in 2005’s second quarter, but the healthy customer numbers resulted from Dobson lowering its postpaid churn rate from 2.25 percent in last year’s second quarter to 1.84 percent in 2006. The regional carrier expects to report average revenue per user of about $47.80, up from $45.28 in the second quarter of 2005 and also a sequential increase from first-quarter 2006 ARPU of $46.76.
Dobson said that it expects roaming minutes of use to be up about one-third over last year’s second quarter, to about 675 million minutes, although roaming yield will likely be down to about 10.5 cents per MOU for the quarter, from 11.8 cents per MOU in last year’s second quarter.
