And then you lose any loyalty or banked credits because it’s technically a “New contract”
I had 100GB of data credit in my pre paid phone plan. I got 2GB a month for $5 unlimited talk and text starting in 2014, it’s a good deal for me. And you can imagine how long it took to bank 100GB even with the occasional free bonus data promo… That plan was replaced with a more expensive one but somehow I got grandfathered in to the cheap plan.
So naturally I didn’t want to rock the boat when I was getting my phone for $5 a month (their cheapest plan now is $20)
But they finally caught on and moved me to the $20 this year, they automatically transferred my data bank and sent me the new terms.
I double checked and while this was their cheapest monthly plan the 6 month plan would save me $80 in the long term so I called to get swapped and they said that I’d lose my data bank because it was a new contract. I argued that they changed my contract and I should have had an opportunity to choose which new contract my data gets transferred to.
I spent ages debating it, but there was nothing the rep or their supervisor could do to reward my 10 years with their company or compensate me for the service I had pre paid for (data) that they now expected me to subscribe to on their new terms to be able to access despite the contract I signed saying something totally different.
Their leading budget competitor had the exact same overall rate but for a yearly pre paid plan, and new customers got a 150GB data bank start up bonus. So my phone bill is paid up for the year now and I’ve still got a decent chunk of data and it didn’t cost more than I was prepared to pay the old company.
(and yes I do use it, I’m a substitute teacher so I’m always using my phone as a hot spot when I’m at a different school)
If they use the phrasing “new or returning customers” you can just cancel your service then sign up again.
And then you lose any loyalty or banked credits because it’s technically a “New contract”
I had 100GB of data credit in my pre paid phone plan. I got 2GB a month for $5 unlimited talk and text starting in 2014, it’s a good deal for me. And you can imagine how long it took to bank 100GB even with the occasional free bonus data promo… That plan was replaced with a more expensive one but somehow I got grandfathered in to the cheap plan.
So naturally I didn’t want to rock the boat when I was getting my phone for $5 a month (their cheapest plan now is $20)
But they finally caught on and moved me to the $20 this year, they automatically transferred my data bank and sent me the new terms.
I double checked and while this was their cheapest monthly plan the 6 month plan would save me $80 in the long term so I called to get swapped and they said that I’d lose my data bank because it was a new contract. I argued that they changed my contract and I should have had an opportunity to choose which new contract my data gets transferred to.
I spent ages debating it, but there was nothing the rep or their supervisor could do to reward my 10 years with their company or compensate me for the service I had pre paid for (data) that they now expected me to subscribe to on their new terms to be able to access despite the contract I signed saying something totally different.
Their leading budget competitor had the exact same overall rate but for a yearly pre paid plan, and new customers got a 150GB data bank start up bonus. So my phone bill is paid up for the year now and I’ve still got a decent chunk of data and it didn’t cost more than I was prepared to pay the old company.
(and yes I do use it, I’m a substitute teacher so I’m always using my phone as a hot spot when I’m at a different school)
I benefit from this because I’m always a returning customer.
Every time I have a service I haven’t cancelled in awhile, I go cancel and resubscribe just to make sure they haven’t hidden the cancel button.