One of the barriers to switching to cellular service from MetroPCS has always been the cost of buying a new handset.
Because MetroPCS provides month-to-month service rather than two-year contracts, it does not subsidize handsets. Users pay the carrier full price, and even the most basic model costs $79.
Gowing forward, however, some new customers won’t have to pay anything for new phones. They’ll be able to use their old phones on MetroPCS.
As part of a new program called MetroFlash, the Richardson-based cellular carrier will start converting several hundred handset models for use on its network.
MetroPCS can’t convert any phones sold through AT&T or T-Mobile USA, which use a absolutely different cellular technology that MetroPCS.
Phones sold through Verizon, Sprint and Alltel, however, use the same technology as MetroPCS, so many of their handset models can be converted via MetroFlash.
The folks at MetroPCS think MetroFlash will prove a large hit. One sentence of the press release reads, “Not since number portability have consumers been offered such a convenient option in switching service providers.”
MetroPCS charges $30 to convert phones but it throws in a free month of service (to all new customers), which pretty much cancels out that charge.
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