On Monday, to celebrate its second anniversary as cheap mobile phone service, Ting wireless announced that it was reducing its rates for data, among a few other minor changes to its rate chart.
The price reduction for data starts with the “M” or medium level on the chart with “S” tier level staying the same at $3 for 1-100 megabytes. The following changes are listed below, which you can also see in the graphic rate chart above (changes in red):
- “M” level (101-500 Megabytes) decreases from $13 to $12
- “L” level (501-1000 Megabytes) decreases from $24 to $19
- “XL” level (1001 – 2000 Megabytes) decreases from $42 to $29
- “XXL” level eliminated for all rate categories: minutes, messages, and data
- Any data greater than 2,000 Megabytes/month will cost 1.5 cents per Megabyte
- “XL” level for maximum minutes was increased from 2,000 minutes to 2,100 minutes
- Any minutes greater than 2,100 now cost 1.9 cents per minute
- “XL” level for maximum text messages was increased from 4,000 texts to 4,800 texts
As we can see, the changes likely won’t effect you much unless you are a heavy user in which case you’ll save on the higher tiered data levels.
However, even though the rate decreases are certainly a nice gesture on Ting’s part, I’m not sure how much this will effect the attractiveness of the Ting service since most of the cost savings for switching to Ting come from people who don’t use their phones a whole lot.
If you were a heavy data user, then Ting might not make a lot of sense even with the lower rates, since there are already cheaper unlimited low cost plans out there like Republic Wireless. For instance, if you were in the “XL” category you’d be paying a minimum of $29 per month just for data, yet Republic Wireless offers an unlimited everything plan on the same Sprint network for just $25 per month.
Regardless, I still think this was a good move on Ting’s part in its efforts to become more of a leader in the increasingly competitive low cost mobile phone plan arena.
For those out there using the Ting service, would you mind leaving a comment below and letting us know how these new rates might effect your monthly bill, if at all?
I have been with Verizon for many years now. Our contract will be expiring this August, 2015, and I am researching for a new cell service provider. We live in a city with high cell service coverage but we are not getting the full amount of Verizon service that we are paying for. Our cells do not work well inside or outside our home. The cell reception is so bad that I have to ask callers if I can call them back from my land line. I would not have the land line if my cell worked at my house….more wasted money. Verizon’s solution to our bad reception is for us to purchase a network extender that basically “bridges the gap of poor reception” from Verizon’s network….Seriously??? So on top of their high monthly rates and additional taxes and fees added monthly I need to spend more money to fix Verizon’s bad network service issues! I need a new cell service provider!
So my question is how do I find out which network provider has the closest cell towers to my home?
Hi Brooke,
One thing you can do is check OpenSignal.com which is a handy tool for seeing the tower coverage strength of different networks.
Another thing to look at is a provider that has the ability to switch seamlessly between the cell towers and a wifi connection. So if you had wi-fi in your home, that might help with the bad reception in your home. Unfortunately, there are only a few companies doing this now but it is starting to increase in popularity. One is Republic Wireless which is what I currently use, but T-Mobile and Sprint also offer wi-fi calling on certain phones as well.
Hope that helps and that you’ll be able to escape the evil clutches of Verizon 🙂