Sprint was the only one of the four Tier-1 carriers to lose more customers than it gained in the fourth quarter, new data from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners indicates.
According to CIRP, T-Mobile grew its customer base by 22 percent in the quarter, while AT&T and Verizon each grew theirs by 6 percent. On the flip side, though, Sprint’s customer base slid 14 percent during the period.
By carrier, CIRP found T-Mobile lost 20 percent of phone activations to other carriers, but its gains of 39 percent from other carriers were more than enough to offset that figure. AT&T lost 18 percent to rivals, but gained 24 percent from competitors, and Verizon’s 18 percent in gains more than canceled out its 13 percent in losses. But while Sprint made gains of 23 percent similar to Verizon and AT&T, its losses of 37 percent were proved too much to overcome.
“T-Mobile has loyalty rates that are somewhat close to those of AT&T and Verizon, with 80 percent of existing T-Mobile customers that activated a phone in the quarter remaining with T-Mobile,” CIRP Co-Founder and Partner Josh Lowitz observed. “Yet, T-Mobile also continues to attract a higher percentage of customers that switch from other carriers. Its innovative plans continue to draw attention, and with improved network quality advertising, it now is closer in overall market presence to AT&T and Verizon than it is to Sprint.”
But despite T-Mobile’s strength, CIRP noted Verizon topped the list in terms of consumer loyalty, with 87 percent.
“Regional and pre-paid carriers continue to lose significant ground to the leaders,” added Mike Levin, CIRP Partner and Co-Founder. “The retention rate of 68 percent in the quarter is far below the 80-87 percent for AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, but actually exceeded that of Sprint. They also attracted far fewer switchers from other carriers, and could not make up the losses with the increasingly smaller base of first-time phone buyers.”
The report comes right at the start of fourth quarter earnings reports, which kicked off yesterday with Verizon and will continue this afternoon with AT&T.
Verizon reported 167,000 net postpaid phone additions – up from loses of 36,000 in the third quarter – and overall postpaid net additions of 591,000, missing Wall Street estimates.
AT&T and T-Mobile have both released previews of their fourth quarter figures, with AT&T teasing 330,000 branded net phone additions and T-Mobile touting 933,000 postpaid phone net additions and 541,000 branded prepaid net additions.
CIRP said its findings are based on a January survey of 500 U.S. individuals who activated a new or used phone in the October through December 2016 period.
