T-Mobile is killing off employer discounts starting tomorrow

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John Legere

In what couldn’t possibly be any worse timing, T-Mobile has announced that — starting tomorrow, April 1st — the nation’s 4th largest network will effectively end all employer discounts. And no, this isn’t a joke.

This means that anyone who was enjoying discounted service rates through their employer will soon be greeted with a higher monthly bill. As a sort of consolation prize, T-Mobile says that they’ll be giving a $25 T-Mobile gift card for every new employee device purchase which isn’t much, but at least it’s something.

The logic, T-Mobile says, behind the move is that those old employers discount programs were designed to help big carriers close corporate contracts while using employees as their “bargaining chips.” T-Mobile doesn’t play that way. And while Legere would have you believe this is yet another phase in their Uncarrier movement, we’d be willing to bet it has more to do with Magenta’s overalls earnings slipping during Q4 of last year.

Anyone out there soon to be affected by this new move?

[T-Mobile | Photo: Geekwire]

Chris Chavez
I've been obsessed with consumer technology for about as long as I can remember, be it video games, photography, or mobile devices. If you can plug it in, I have to own it. Preparing for the day when Android finally becomes self-aware and I get to welcome our new robot overlords.

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63 Comments

  1. I’m going to be paying $30 more a month now due to this change. The only thing keeping me on T-Mobile is unlimited data, i’m now paying the same as I would with AT&T(as AT&T offers me an even bigger discount). After this takes effect, I may need to reconsider switching to AT&T.

    1. Straighttalk might be better?

      1. Really? Hows ST better? He said unlimited data not some stupid 2.5 GB data.

        1. I’ve seen 10 gigs of shared data too, I use about 15 gigs on tmobile.

          1. How the hell do you use 15 gigs of mobile data. Bro, do you even wifi?

          2. Google maps satellite view, while using pandora hd, YouTube videos hd on @ 1080p. Netflix, random apps, I use wifi but I don’t need to because I don’t worry about my limit plus my speeds on Lte are sometimes faster than my wifi speeds.

          3. Your battery life must be horrific. Using a laptop with an hdmi cable hooked up to your tv would be far better for your battery life.

          4. It does kill your battery. I’ve been in an accident and lost my car, so I’m spending about 2 hours on the bus. Catching up on all my shows, but my battery life. =.[

            But that external battery charger, though. =.]

            Though I was able to watch Attack On Titan in 5 days. I could never accomplish that when I was driving. Spent most of my time sleeping. =.P

          5. Attack on Titan should be watched on a bigger screen, man.

          6. Tether to my Nexus 7. I ain’t havin’ that tiny screen. LoL!! That anime was good. Oh my gosh, from the 1st episode, I was hooked.

          7. 5 days!? Weak! It only took me 2! XD

          8. i have a 10,000 milliamp battery that last 2 days with maximum abuse! on my note 3.

          9. Dude… The WiFi at my school sux. The access points keep dropping. They suck. I want us to put the other ones back. And it makes me mad because I average 1MBps download speeds. =.[

            At home wii have like 3Mbps. =.[

            So no, I don’t WiFi.

          10. Not everybody has wifi at work, I stream a lot of radio in a month.

    2. Your paying the same now as you would on AT&T? Unlimited data on AT&T?

    3. Unless you have 5 lines I don’t get how your saving 20 a month?? The discount only applies to the cost of the plan…no taxes or phones & our discounts ranged from 8-18% … If I had 5 lines with the simple choice with the old simple choice pricing 70-50-30-30-30 that’s 210…So if you had the 18 % you actually saved 20, but most discounts I seen were never above 15% & most ppl don’t have 5 lines with unlimited everything on each line

      1. interesting… but where did he write he was saving $20 a month??

        also, you claim a maximum of 18%, I’ve seen people post on this thread they were receiving up to 27%.

  2. Ouch…that was one of the reasons I switched to T-Mobile.

  3. well I was going to start my corporate discount this week..I just needed to fill out application… well that sucks….I would of saved ≈$20 per month….

    1. same here and i was going to do the family plan of 4 lines and unlimited a month ago. but I waited too long and they raised the unlimited by $10/line. so, now i certainly won’t do it b/c i would have been able to offset it with the 15% discount. don’t really need unlimited anyway. i’ll save about $35/mo by going through the walmart family plan of 4 lines (only 2.5gb/mo data). and its funny b/c they use t-mobile as the service provider. lol

  4. should really change the article photo..cause I see nothing to be smiling about.

  5. i’ll be paying more… but it’s still better than anyone else

  6. Does this include military discount?

    1. Government discounts will remain unchanged.

    2. What branch?

        1. No it does not. Unless they changed it after I clocked out.

        2. Ten year Navy vet here. *hi5*

    3. Looks like I’m losing my 27 percent discount and having to tap into the 15 percent military one lol. Still a discount is better than nothing.

    4. NO! Military personnel are not affected

  7. So they say its not an April fools joke, but cmon people it obviously is. Tmobile is in the business of making it a benefit to be with their service not the other way around. I’m calling it now, no way this happens

    1. considering this new broke on Friday, it’s NOT a joke. they were just late on reporting it

      1. ZOMG! The news broke Friday! Its official this is 100% not an April fools day joke. They only picked April 1st because it made the most sense and nobody would be suspicious of the timing.

        1. We were told to stop offering the corperate discounts about a month ago because they would be going away, it’s not a joke I don’t know when they will be taken off of exsisting accounts. I just know it’s now impossible to add

          1. They are dropping the discount on April 25th for ALL corporate customers.

  8. so those working cushy corporate jobs will have to pay $80 to get everything unlimited like everyone else.

    1. Its not all cushy corporate jobs. Im sure some are but alot are the electric and telecommunications industry. Not all, but alot are actual laborers.

    2. Or any one with an entry or mid level position or teacher etc that just happens to use the right pay roll company. I had a small discount. Nothing to write home about but the $12/mo offset taxes.

  9. Like no lie, I was just thinking about working for Tmo to get employee discounts. I log into Phandroid to read the latest articles and this was the first thing I see. =.[

    1. Ummmm they’re not talking about their own employee discounts. They’re talking about corporate contracts that give other employers, employees discounts.

      1. Oh!! My bad. I get it now. Thanks.

    2. Banks get crazy discounts. I get 27 percent discounted for working at a bank.

      1. For being a member of Smart Financial, this credit union in town, I would have gotten 10%, I think. But I guess I can forget about setting that up. =.[

      2. your bank must of signed up many customers…. my bank only gets 15%

  10. It’s a joke people. “Starting April 1st”. LOL Phandroid PHAIL

    1. Kill yourself.

  11. If this is for real – I’m not happy about it at all. My 20% corporate discount on T-Mobile has been a godsend.

  12. They picked the perfect time to announce this, the day before April fools day. Some people need to start sending some carrier breakup letters… To. T-Mobile.

    1. I’ve already sent my when they sent a bill full of be charges of $800. Straight talk at&t sim now I get better coverage for less

  13. My company never offered a T-Mobile discount, only Sprint, AT&T, and Verizon. But T-Mobile was still cheaper and better service.

    1. yeah, despite this you’re still not gonna find another company that is gonna give you everything unlimited for $80 a month and if coverage is an issue you shouldn’t have been on tmobile in the first place.

  14. Agreed that tmob is still the cheapest option. I will be losing a 15% discount through my work. One thing that peeves me though is how Mr. Legere is handling this. Some of his twitter comments are kind of douchey….almost combative to people complaining. It kind of reminds me of netflix a couple years ago when they had their big rate hike.

    1. You’re only just now noticing he is douchey?

  15. Too bad that the discount will be going away, especially since I just joined the ranks of T-Mobile just 2 weeks ago! But as others said, T-Mobile is still turning out to be much cheaper, and still cheaper than my grandfathered limited minutes/text plus unlimited data.

    I couldn’t be happier with my switch from Verizon to T-Mobile. I am getting overall faster data speeds and better coverage at the places I frequent like work, school and gym. For some reason, I felt like Verizon was throttling me since I was still on their unlimited data. I’d compare the speeds with other Verizon users next to me and they would get faster speeds.

    Oh well, good riddance Verizon—twas not fun!

  16. T-Mo is making a blunder by this announcement, how Mr Legere can do this ? >>>>>> http://www.telecomvibe.com

  17. Damn! Just after I switched to a family plan with my girlfriend too.

  18. From Un-Carrier to Carrier. This move will increase T-Mo’s per customer profit significantly. My family has two lines on T-Mo saving about 17 per month with employer discount. A one time discount with the purchase of a new phone is not much of a discount ( an incentive for the jump program, which is a extra $30 a month per phone line). Do the math 17+30=47$ or 17+30+30=77$ plus down payment charges for new jump plan phones (100-200$) . That 564$ per year plus new phone charges or 924$ per year plus new phone charges. I guess the merger with AT&T went through. AT&T&T-Mobile is alive and well

  19. What’s really bad is that they are not going to grandfather people in.

  20. This basically put me back to what I was paying before all the uncarrier stuff. I am not impressed and can easily take advantage of another carriers next promotion. I was a T-Mobile evangelist too. This going to be over $120 dollar a year difference. There goes me buying the M8 in 10 days too. They really messed up doing this.

  21. Wow, I switched to T-Mobile last year from VZW as soon as the whole :Uncarrier” thing started. And I bough my phones outright. With this move, I think I’m gonna try out AT&T. For what they have been advertising, I think my bill would be pretty comparable.

    1. Same here! just hate to lose the unlimited data

  22. Sigh… I was hoping this was some sort of elaborate April Fool’s Joke by T-Mob but alas, no announcement about it being a joke. Either way, I’ll stay with them as per my previous comment below.

  23. Time to shine baby.

    http://imgur.com/BCEAgWy

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