Cricket

[fjclaus]

Why is it that Cricket can offer UNLIMITED local calling for only $39.99, and the other cell companies can't? I would use my phone a lot more if Cingular or Verzion would offer that.

[jmccrane]

Cricket= looking for a niche, small company, small area.
Cingular, Verizon, etc.= big companies, drive market.

If someone did match Cricket and was a big player, then others would follow. However, Cricket's plan only gives you a small area from which to make calls.

[roamer1]

...and they oversell their network to hell and back (at least in some areas) [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-mad.gif[/img]

(someone reported here a few months ago that, on average, Cricket users use approx. 3x the minutes customers of other carriers do)

Also, the prepaid nature of such services reduces bad debt, and not supporting roaming lowers back-end infrastructure costs, and the local nature of such services allows for less marketing expenses, etc.

-SC

[NokiaKrazy]

And for such a limited network, the only way to attract people is to give away the farm.

[coalminer]

Well, since it is all really prepaid, there are no collections cost for people that dont pay their bill.

When you buy a phone from them, they are not paying part of it.

They dont have to print up 20 page bills with all of the calls you make.

They dont have to have huge call centers to deal with all of the people calling to complain about calls they dont think they made.

They dont have to have a network that is connected to other networks for roaming, which saves alot ( but I have heard from a good source that Northcoast here in Cleveland is going to offer pre-paid roaming for thier customers ).

And since long distance is not included, that is not a big expense ( this person also told me that Northcoast was going to offer a plan with unlimited long distance ).

See how they can offer unlimited plans now?

[Rae]

Many (if not all) of the larger carriers do not have networks that can handle "all you can eat" wireless. Cricket networks were built with higher call volume and greater MOUs in mind.

[coalminer]

That is very true, I know when I had my Northcoast phone, and would try to do radio call in contests, I never had a system busy message like I do with my Verizon phone. I dont even bother to try anymore, when the phone rings you get your hopes up and then you get that recording saying all circuits are busy.