Sounds like someone — and by someone we mean SoftBank — is feeling pretty darn good about its burgeoning relationship with the object of its affections: Sprint Nextel got the go ahead from its current steady to take a closer look at what Dish Network is offering it in a rival deal. [More]
SoftBank Feels Secure Enough In Its Relationship With Sprint To Let It Consider Dish Deal
By April 29, 2013
Sprint Pushing FCC To Approve SoftBank Deal While It’s Still Totally Dating Dish Network
By April 22, 2013
Sprint, we didn’t know you were such a player on the dating scene. While the company is asking for the Federal Communications Commission to keep working on its official review of a $20.1 billion SoftBank deal, it’s also openly flirting with its other suitor, Dish Network. That’s what we call playing the field, folks. Wonder if it’ll go on two dates in the same night? [More]
Dish Network Throws $25.5 Billion On The Table In Bid For Sprint Nextel
By April 15, 2013
It’s been about six months since Japanese Wireless company SoftBank said it’d pay a handsome price to buy control of Sprint. And in yet another example of how a much-buzzed about hookup sometimes fails to get to the completion stage, there’s another company suddenly in the running to woo Sprint — the pay-TV giant, Dish Network. [More]
How A Sprint Kiosk Worker Got Me In Trouble With The Discount Police
By January 24, 2013
R. decided to be scrupulously honest. He had a 15% discount on his Sprint bill because of his employer. When he switched jobs and moved to a different state, he kept his Sprint plan but dutifully reported that he wasn’t eligible for the discount anymore. Unfortunately, he reported this to a Sprint kiosk worker, who failed to actually remove the discount. Moral of the story: no matter who helps you, make sure the changes went through. [More]
Sprint Sells Blind Man Wrong Phone, Charges Restocking Fee, Shrugs
By January 21, 2013
Orlando is blind, and had a very specific set of requirements while shopping for a new phone. The staff of the local Sprint store apparently weren’t very savvy about accessibility features on the phones they sell, though, so they sold him the wrong one. Who paid the quite literal price for this error, in the form of a restocking fee? Orlando, of course. [More]
Sprint Authorized Retailer Promises No Activation Fees, Guess What Happens Next
By January 3, 2013
Tom had a problem with Sprint: an authorized retailer had broken a promise and/or set up his phone upgrade incorrectly. He set out to remedy it by deploying an exquisitely crafted executive e-mail carpet bomb. Now, when you deploy an EECB, we recommend that you provide relevant details, but also that you open with a short executive summary so that the busy people you’re emailing (or their busy underlings) can get a quick idea of what you’re complaining about, and route it to the correct person instead of immediately trashing your missive.
If you spend a lot of time online, think of an executive summary as a “tl;dr” summary that you put first, instead of at the end. Combine that with a clear letter and spelling out his (quite reasonable) expectations, and it’s no wonder that Sprint whipped a response and a resolution to him within the hour. [More]
Sprint Salesman Won’t Sell Me iPhone 4, Says My Fingers Are Too Fat
By December 18, 2012
The salesperson at Alex’s local Sprint store really didn’t want to sell him an iPhone 4. That phone is old and stuff. Alex knew what he wanted to replace his broken phone: a free phone. Well, a subsidized upgrade with no out-of-pocket cost, anyway. He needed a new phone. He was broke. There was an upgrade on his account. He just wanted a working smartphone. So began the salesman’s campaign to get Alex to buy a Galaxy S III instead. [More]
Report: Cops Want Wireless Carriers To Save Text Messages, You Know, Just In Case
By December 4, 2012
That thing you texted to that person the other night which you deleted out of overwhelming shame the next day? Messages like that could be pored over in the future by cops if various law enforcement officials have their way. They’re reportedly asking Congress to make wireless carriers record and store customers’ private text messages for at least two years, in case police need that info for a future investigation. [More]
Sprint Says Virgin Mobile Site Isn't Completely Insecure; Blogger Disagrees
By September 19, 2012
Earlier this week, we told you about blogger Kevin Burke’s claims that the website for Virgin Mobile (a subsidiary of Sprint) is incredibly vulnerable to any hacker who could write a script to generate PINs. Since then, Sprint has told Consumerist that the site isn’t as much of an open door to hackers as it’s been made to be, while Burke claims that the phone folks are missing the point. [More]
Blogger: Virgin Mobile Accounts Are Vulnerable To Hack; No One Seems To Care
By September 17, 2012
A Virgin Mobile customer claims that it’s easy for hackers to access customers’ accounts via the wireless provider’s website — and not only is there nothing customers can do to defend themselves, the folks at the Virgin don’t really seem too concerned about it. [More]
Will You Be Able To Take Your Unlimited Data Plan With You If You Upgrade To iPhone 5?
By September 13, 2012
Yesterday, Apple went through its occasional ritual of taking an hour to go over every minute detail of its new phone. But what wasn’t mentioned in that overlong introduction to the iPhone 5 was what it means for the folks who still have unlimited data plans from back in the day. [More]
Sprint Is Upgrading Its Network Here, When Should I Upgrade My Phone?
By September 13, 2012
Erica and her family are Sprint customers who are eligible to upgrade their phones in a few months, but they have a dilemma. In the market where they live, Sprint’s 4G service is the older WiMax network. An upgrade to LTE is coming…sometime in the next year. They have their choice of phones that can use one network or the other, but not both. Yes, this is the very definition of a first world problem, but it’s a gamble. Do they choose faster data now and being forced to use 3G after the upgrade comes, or the other way around? [More]
Should Sprint Tell Me That I Could Switch To A Cheaper Data Plan?
By September 11, 2012
Amy may be the first reader in Consumerist history to complain about being left on an unlimited mobile data plan. She has tethering on her smartphone, which lets her use her phone as a mobile Internet hotspot. Yes, apps exist that can help you get around this limitation. Officially, if you want to tether, you generally have to pay for a data plan that includes it. Amy was paying for a $30/month plan, but learned that she was grandfathered in, and a cheaper plan existed. Sure, the cheaper plan only includes two gigabytes of data, but she never uses that much anyway. It costs $10 less. She wanted to alert her fellow Sprint customers to this change, and complain that the company didn’t let her know she had an opportunity to give them less money in exchange for capped data. [More]
Sprint To Roll Out 4G LTE Network To 100 Cities Over Coming Months
By September 10, 2012
While Sprint may be a distant third place in the wireless wars, the folks in yellow are not going down without a fight. Earlier today, the company announced a plan to roll out a new 4G LTE network in more than 100 cities during the near future. [More]
No Sprint Service, Let Out Of Contract If I Surrender My New Phone
By August 14, 2012
Vincent has been a Sprint customer for a long time, and it’s only just recently that his service really started to suck. He drops or misses calls, and can’t get a data connection. ONly after calling the Consumerist Hotline did he learn that the problem is systemic: their network is overloaded in his area, and there might be a solution at the end of this year. Sprint has made him an offer: they’ll let him out of his contact without an early termination fee, but only if he gives back his recently purchased smartphone. He says that he shelled out $400 for this phone, and would have sold it to another Sprint customer to recoup some of his losses. What should he do? [More]
Sprint Fires Customer For Excessive Roaming, Won't Unlock His iPhone
By August 13, 2012
Sprint fired Christian. Oh, he didn’t work for them: they fired him as a customer. He doesn’t live near any of their towers, and so he ended up doing a lot of data roaming. Displeased, Sprint sent him a letter to tell him that he was being let go. Christian called up Sprint and was told that he would be allowed to unlock his shiny new iPhone 4S and use it on AT&T. He ported his number out to AT&T, then learned that the representative he had talked to is the only person in the Sprint organization who will tell customers that they can use their iPhones on another US carrier. [More]
Bring Your Own Phone? Sprint Still Wants A Contract
By August 7, 2012
Clayton was under the impression that mobile phone contracts exist because carriers want to lock us in and recoup the costs of subsidizing our handset purchases. That makes sense, right? I mean, if we bring our own phones when signing up with a new carrier, we’re just exchanging money for phone service, and there’s no reason to lock us into a contract. Right? Right, Sprint? [More]
If Bloatware Keeps You From Downloading Phone Apps You Actually Want, Should Carriers Offer An Upgrade?
By August 7, 2012
We’ve written before about the annoyances of bloatware — those apps you are never ever going to use but come with your smartphone and cannot be deleted no matter how much you swear at your phone. Consumerist reader Ryan’s got his own bone to pick with zombie apps that can’t be killed on his Sprint phone, because they’re interfering with his ability to use it in the way he intended when he bought it. In short: he can’t download apps he actually wants because the bloatware takes up too much space, even with a new SD card. [More]
