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Verizon may have started a trend when they opted to go rebate-less on their high-end handsets. Sprint has confirmed that starting March 27th, the carrier will offer discounts on handsets instantly instead of via a mail-in rebate system. For now it seems the company is simply offering the new model on a trial basis, and won’t promise a commitment to instant rebates for the long term. Here is hoping they like how it goes, as spending less money up front is always much appreciated.
[via MobileCrunch]
FLO: Isn’t getting discounts great?
ooo! ohhhh! YES!!!!!! YES!!!! YES!!!!!!
FLO: There’s no discount for agreeing with me.
Yeah, I got carried away there…
FLO: Happens to me all the time!
I didn’t have to do mail in on my evo, best buy took care of it for me.
Same here! :-)
Mail in rebates are pointless anyway. A waste of time and paper. Go Green!
Finally!!!
That was a big detractor for me in even thinking about going to Sprint. They wanted almost $1,000 in startup costs for 3 EVO’s when I priced them out last year.
Now ditch the $10 “Premium Data” charge and I will leave T-Mob…
I could careless about the premium data charge. Even with it, it’s still cheaper than any of it’s competitors.
Not if you have 3 lines with the $9.99 200 MB data option at T-Mobile.
I don’t live in a 3G area and my work is a dead zone. I use WIFI at home and 200 MB is more than enough when I am on the road.
It’s truly unlimited.
This was the only reason I used best buy mobile. I have no problem buying it directly from Sprint.
This makes me so happy. NEXUS S here i come. new phone August 1st. it’s on
Yup. This is one reason why I use newegg over tigerdirect. U can get the same product on newegg cheaper without the hassles of mail in rebates.
This isn’t accurate being Verizon still has rebates on phones under 199.99. I would say that Sprint took the iniative here in dropping all rebates on all devices.
Sweetening the deal up even more when I ditch At&T-Mobile.
This will definitely persuade me to buy from Sprint directly instead of going to Best Buy or Radio Shack.
I dont dont what took them this long to realize that people hate mail in rebates. They could have asked the experts (people) long time ago….Its a no brainer.
Pretty easy to figure out. People buy a lot of things because of a rebate, but then they forget to mail them off, or they expire, and guess what, the company just made millions of extra dollars on people who forget, or are to lazy to mail off.
Yes I am fine with going directly to sprint that’s no problem. I brought my last evo june 4th at raido shack this time I will go to sprint for the Evo 3d
Let us know how the customer service was. I “might” consider giving Sprint a second chance after this Tmobile merger.
good by radio shack, it was not nice knowing you.
So nobody realizes that at&t did this way before Verizon? At&t started getting rid of rebates on their smartphones last summer.
This will be nice when I go to carry-over a Verizon account to Sprint. It’d reduce the start-up cost of two Nexus phones from the normally $600 (assuming a $100 rebate on each) to $400. Thanks for the gift, Dan Hesse.
radioshack hasn’t done mail in rebates for years. and they always have cheaper phone prices, even after the mail ins. from what i understand, it’s contractually bound to have the lowest offered price.
Mail-In Rebates was the exact reason I wouldnt buy from Sprint stores or on their website. Especially when Best Buy, Radioshack and everyone else had instant rebates.
I’m a Sprint Sales Rep, and I can’t tell you how excited I am for this. I’m an avid Android user and I do my best to put my customers in the right Android phone when they are seeking a smart phone. I worked for Verizon for almost 4 years and then I was offered a good position and made the switch. Hopefully this will last, we need to do extremely well in sales during the trial period for this to become permanent. I acknowledge Sprint is not a perfect company, but the way I look at it is that if Sprint works where you live and travel, then it is a great company to use. The prices are great and with the recent announcements we’ll have a great Android selection. In my opinion, our customer service is top notch. It is a big deal if we get bad feedback from the surveys conducted after customer transactions. I work for a Preferred dealer, which is like a corporate store except we are privately owned. So Please, if you are planning on getting a phone, please visit a store and say Goodbye to the Annoying Rebate. If anybody is in the Raleigh Area, let me know, I can take a little extra off the price of a phone if you are a new customer or adding a line or air card. If your an existing customer, I could work with you on the price of an accessory.
I think my beef with Sprint stemed from ETF fees, even for military deployment. Have they changed that?