T-Mobile Is Forcing Legacy Plans to Upgrade, and Customers Are Pushing Back

Inside T-Mobile’s Business Operations Center.Jeff Carlson/CNET Some T-Mobile customers are looking at a price increase of up to $6 per line this month as the company retires several old phone plans and moves them to the current lineup. A few of the affected plans stretch back 10 to 15 years, including Simple Choice, T-Mobile One, One Plus and the Magenta family of plans, as well as grandfathered Sprint plans that carried over when T-Mobile and Sprint merged in 2020. A T-Mobile representative didn’t share which plans are being retired, but The Mobile Report built a spreadsheet of changes based on its sourcing. Exact dates for the handoff depend on customers’ billing cycles – the new plans should appear on their next bills. Affected subscribers, including some small businesses, should have gotten the news via text or through the T-Life app. You can also visit T-Mobile’s rate plan migration page, which requires you to log in to your account, to check your new plan details. Each affected customer is being moved to a “like-for-like” plan with features similar to their current plan. For example, a CNET colleague’s One Plan TE plan will become Experience More with Appreciation Savings. He’ll gain unlimited high-speed 5G and 4G LTE data, 60GB of mobile hotspot data, Netflix Standard (with ads) and video streaming at up to 4K. However, Apple TV Plus, which had been included for six months through the Apple TV on Us promotion, will instead cost $3 per month. Screenshots show a CNET colleague’s T-Mobile plan migration from the retiring One Plan TE to the new Experience More with Appreciation Savings plan.Screenshot by Jeff Carlson/CNET The Experience More with Appreciation Savings is a special plan for the customers who are being migrated; if he were to switch to the regular Experience More plan, he’d end up paying a higher rate. So far, aside from the optional Apple TV fee, it appears that his monthly cost will not increase with the move. In addition, customers are reporting on Reddit that the T-Mobile Kickback program, which provides credit if you use less than 2GB of data in a month, is being retired along with the plans. Lines that are currently free from old promotions will remain free. (Some customers initially lost their free lines, but T-Mobile is reinstating them, citing technical issues during the transition.) It’s not unusual for companies to take action to shake people off older plans. AT&T added a fee to some of its legacy plans in May, and T-Mobile hiked prices in March 2025. What’s different here is that T-Mobile is taking action directly and automatically, versus encouraging its customers to upgrade. Allan Samson, chief marketing officer at T-Mobile, explained during a briefing prior to the announcement that “absolutely nothing is required of the customer, and it just is going to happen.” He said the legacy plans will be moved to comparable modern plans in the current lineup, which includes Essentials, Essentials Saver, Experience More, Experience Beyond and Better Value. That will bring more features, such as expanded international roaming, premium 5G speeds and greater hotspot data than are available on their older plan. For customers who do see a price increase, “the price they’re going to be paying in a huge majority of cases is still going to be below what that exact plan sells for today,” said Samson. “We’re not moving you all the way up to the rack rate” that a new customer would pay. If you’ve been moved to a new plan and aren’t happy with the one that’s been chosen for you, your only options will be to shop for a new T-Mobile plan or look for a new provider. Although affected subscribers are getting moved whether they want to or not, the shift has prompted formal backlash. According to a report at Fierce Network, one customer has filed notices with T-Mobile’s legal department, the Federal Communications Commission and the California Attorney General, stating that the company’s action breaks the price guarantees made when his retired plan was enacted. The customer, Alex Gerwer, filed an informal complaint with the FCC that was then responded to by T-Mobile. The company reiterated its move, according to a post on Reddit and confirmed by CNET, writing, “While this represents a change for some customers, T-Mobile believes these updated plans better reflect today’s wireless experience and provide meaningful value through enhanced features, benefits, and continued investment in the nation’s largest and fastest 5G network.” The next step would be for Gerwer or other affected customers to file a formal complaint, which involves fees and lawyers. Modernizing internal systems At the heart of the move is a need to reduce complexity in the company’s internal systems. In an internal email sent to employees and seen by CNET, T-Mobile Chief Operating Officer Jon Freier noted that retiring the plans clears out over 1,100 legacy billing codes. “Simplifying the plan mix means even more resources and focus on delivering the outstanding experience we’re known for,” he wrote. Samson explained that like any software or hardware company, there comes a point when the need to modernize outweighs the costs of continuing to support and test for backward compatibility. “A rate plan is a snapshot of the capacity and capability of your network in that moment in time,” Samson said, citing the limited network capacity when the old plans were active. “Fifteen years ago, you checked the weather and maybe your stock report and that was about it. Today we’re streaming 4K movies.” T-Mobile expects that a shift like this, where customers are being moved to new plans whether they want to or not, will require extra support that the company is prepared for. In his memo to employees, Freier acknowledged that “for our frontline teams … while the immediate future will bring increased customer contact volume, we are confident this plan simplification will make your job easier over time.”