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this post was submitted on 13 Oct 2023
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T-mobile: hello sir we are calling about your plan and a way you can save money
Me: that isn't true
T-mobile: umm we can save you money by changing your plan
Me: that statement is false. No company in the history of humanity has spent money to tell their customers how to do less business with them. They are paying you to call me and you expect me to believe that they are paying you money so they can get less money from me in the future? Makes no sense.
When I worked for ATT, I saw a customer with a legacy unlimited data account. This was after they brought back unlimited data after years of overcharging people for data "overages".
I absolutely could not convince this person to change to the new plan that was a third of the price.
They probably had true unlimited, not the 10gb then throttling "unlimited" that's offered now. AT&T has like 3 different levels of unlimited plan...
"Unlimited doesn't mean unlimited. Unlimited has limits. As a matter of fact, there are unlimited limits!" - Telecoms
To be fair, I would likely behave just like that customer out of pure fear of losing a plan I like and never being able to get it back because it's deprecated.
My previous ISP once called me to tell me that i couldn't reach the speed of my current plan from my house, and offered me to take a cheaper package without reducing my speed.
My current ISP sent me a mail at the beginning of this year informing me they were quadrupling my speed at no extra charge. And they did, I went from 50 up/down to 200.
What ISP do you have? Is it a local ISP?
T-Mobile has lowered my prices while increasing my service in the past. The fact that they don't dick me around is one of the reasons I've stayed. If they're going to start this shit, then I'm going to leave.
And go where
My ISP lowered their (already very competitive) prices for no good reason, so some do exist
The reason is retention. For a company that sells a service where they pay a single overhead (like maintaining a structure) it always makes more sense to lose a little money and retain a customer if prices are going down elsewhere.
That is to say if your internet plan is $80 and they have intel that a local competitor has started selling a similar plan for $60, it makes more sense to spend 3 minutes talking to an existing customer about lowering their bill to $60 rather than let that customer discover a cheaper plan and switch to someone else. If they let that customer switch they lose the whole $80 whereas if they just lower that customer's price they only lose $20.
They are the sole owner of the fiber around here, you aren't getting faster more stable internet for that price, no way.
I was paying about around $30 for gigabit, which is awesome here in the Czech republic. They dropped the price by $5 to $25.
I understand why companies would do it usually, but here, I honestly don't see why they would. They're offering great service for great prices
My ISP has called me and offered me cheaper internet more then once for the same speed I was on. And one time it was faster and cheaper.
There is a plausible economic incentive to do this:
Reputation.
This happens less in markets with few, big sellers and lots of customers locked into long-term contracts (like ISPs), but it does happen occasionally in high competition markets where customers can take their business elsewhere easily.
Restaurants are a good example - where I live, a host might hand out a round of after-meal shots on the house to encourage a big table of uncomplicated guests to come again.
That's not entirely true. I recall a consulting client who had a customer program where redeemable points didn't expire.
The thing was, this meant that inactive accounts with just a handful of points ended up costing a ton in accounting upkeep because they had to account for the possibility these years old accounts might suddenly redeem points.
So they rolled out a new program that was legit much better for the vast majority of active accounts to migrate people over.
Yes, it was still them doing something that was to save them money, but the new alternative was also better for the customer too. It was simply closing a loophole they'd not thought about when first designing it which didn't benefit the customers, it simply led to procedural costs that skyrocketed.
So there are rarely cases where companies will spend money to do something in your interests. It's just always going to also be in their own interests too.
Yes, the good old "the more you spend, the more you save!"
AKA you spend more but you get some much more value that actually you're saving (no you're not).
I’ve actually had Verizon call me to offer a lower rate for faster home internet. I presume it extended my contract and somehow got the sales person a bonus but it still cost me $15 less per month.
Over the years, Verizon has increased my speed twice without additional charges. But not for the same price I was paying in the first story.