In a recent development, T-Mobile is implementing another round of price increases for certain customers, following a similar move last June. While the specifics regarding the number of customers affected remain unclear, a memo obtained by CNET reveals that some individuals will experience a $5 per-line increase starting with their April or May bills.
The memo, issued by Jon Freier, the president of T-Mobile's consumer group, indicates that affected customers will be notified by the end of today, March 13. It's important to note that only those receiving a notification will see the rate increase. Freier attributes this price hike to the rising operational costs that have affected the industry over the past several years.
Other major carriers are also experiencing similar challenges. For instance, Verizon instituted price increases last December and January, while AT&T followed suit in January and June of the previous year.
At this point, it remains unclear which legacy plans are subject to these new increases. Customers currently subscribed to T-Mobile's modern plans—namely Go5G, Go5G Plus, and Go5G Next—will not be impacted by this price change. Additionally, those with T-Mobile's Price Lock guarantee or promotional free lines will also be exempt from the increase, with the memo suggesting that millions of customers fall into this category.
Even after excluding these current and promotional plans, the exact number of affected customers is still unknown. Notably, the price hikes from last June were not uniformly applied across all legacy plans, indicating that some customers may remain unaffected.
In the memo, Freier mentions that T-Mobile is finalizing the price adjustment initiative that began last year. He emphasizes that accounts that already experienced a price hike will not see an additional increase as part of this new initiative. For example, if a customer faced a $5 increase on their older plan last year, they will not incur another hike on top of that.
However, it is worth noting that individuals who had a price adjustment on non-smartphone products, like a cellular watch plan, may see an adjustment on their older phone plan. In these cases, while the $5 increase wouldn't be compounded, it could still apply to another line on the account.
Despite the new price increase, T-Mobile assures customers that all existing benefits and types of rate plans will remain unchanged. In previous instances, customers had the option to reach out to customer support to contest T-Mobile's efforts to transition them to newer, more expensive plans. This approach ultimately led the company to retract that strategy. However, similar to last year's increase, the new adjustments will be automatically applied to the affected accounts.
For those impacted by the latest price changes, it is recommended to stay informed by checking their T-Mobile accounts and awaiting the official notification from the company.
