"SMS" <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in message
news:SwjWj.971$l97.68@flpi144.ffdc.sbc.com...
> Todd Allcock wrote:

>>>> Can we at least agree that your above stated reason for their churn is
>>>> your _opinion_ rather than any independently documented evidence?
>>> No, but if it makes you happy, we can say that it's _one_ of the reasons
>>> for their high churn.
>>
>>
>> Then I have to play the "Navas card": cite, please? Point to ANY
>> evidence
>> coverage is a leading cause of their churn.
>
> "http://tinyurl.com/5mprh8" among many others.

More recent studies show price is gaining on coverage to where they're
almost at parity when choosing a carrier (while not a "churn" study per se,
it follows logically that someone churns from one carrier to land at another
for the reason that they churned...)
http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=2145

> But no, I can't prove that T-Mobile's reasons for churn are not different
> than the research indicates for carriers in general. In fact, if they did
> a study that broke down reasons for churn by carrier I'd expect T-Mobile
> to have a higher percentage of customers that left due to coverage issues
> than with the other carriers.

Perhaps, but again, coverage doesn't seem to be Sprint's problem currently.

> Think about why everyone doesn't switch to T-Mobile? It's not handset
> selection (other than perhaps the lack of the iPhone without unlocking).

Selection certainly could be one factor- their selection is piss poor,
unless you want one of there seeming endless "limited edition" Sidekicks,
the quasi-PDa for the slacker generation. High-end handset selection is one
of the worst.

> It could be the lack of 3G, but relatively few subscribers are using 3G
> anyway.

They do and they don't, whether they realize it or not- the data services
that most carriers offer and T-Mo doesn't are made possible by 3G or other
mobile network features T-Mobile lacks- mobile TV, music download services,
navigation services (GPS and locator), etc. T-Mo is the blandest, most
featureless, service out there. T-Mo is essentially a low-end talk/text
service.

> It's not cost, as they offer the lowest cost price/minute.

Yes, but unfortunately, that's not the sole factor in pricing. They have
the smallest network, rendering mobile-to-mobile all but worthless- I
personally know far more Sprint, AT&T, and Verizon customers than T-Mo
customers, (not surprising, statistically speaking, of course!) so T-Mo is
the least likely to attract customers looking for free calls to their
friends and family (hence their "myFaves" plans to try and overcome that
limitation.)

More importantly, ARPU numbers for all carriers suggest that most carriers
stick with low-end calling plans (when most carrier's ARPU is $50, and $10
of THAT is data, what does that leave for the voice plan?) If you can get
by with Verizon's or AT&T's 450 minutes plus "free" minutes (M2M, N&W, etc.)
for $40, as most customers seem to manage, T-Mobile's extra 200 or 300
minutes on most plans offer no real attraction.

> It's not the customer service, which by all accounts is the best in the
> industry.

Only a factor if you need it! ;-)

> The same reason people don't go to T-Mobile in the first place, is the
> reason they leave. It's the network. Yes, they are trying to improve it,
> but they aren't spending like crazy to achieve a marginal increase in
> coverage. They're content in their niche.

"Niche" somehow assumes T-Mo is far behind the other carriers- 30 million
customers is no small feat, considering that they're the only carrier
(besides Verizon) whose large customer base wasn't created overnight by
nature of a relatively recent large acquision. Where would
70-million-strong AT&T rank if they were still Cingular and ATTWS? Perhaps
at 40 and 30 million respectively? 45/25? Where would Sprint be (besides
MUCH better off financially!) if Sprint and Nextel were still seperate
companies? T-Mo would probably be a "middle of the pack" wireless company
in a field of six, rather than the bottom of a field of four.

I'm certainly not suggesting coverage has nothing to do with their churn-
I've acknowledged many times they have the smallest footprint of any
national carrier. But as you've said yourself- they go out of their way to
discourage signing up customers that have lousy coverage where they live or
work (the two places most of us spend the vast majority of their time.)
Given that a significant number of potentially coverage-challenged customers
never get on the network in the first place, it would seem logical that the
lion's share of their churn issues are elsewhere.