Steve

texts are VERY lite in regards to the amount of data/time used.

Maybe, but if texting has increased 10-fold in the last couple of years, that could be a significant enough increase justify a price increase. (I don’t know if this is the case; I’m just playing a bit of Devil’s Advocate here. If anybody has real numbers on texting, please let us know.)

I’m just thinking that people are relying more on txt messages as a cheaper alternative than burning their cell minutes and the providers are seeing a drop in income… especially as they sell their plans based on lower cost minutes/bulk minute plans

Perhaps, but I haven’t exceeded my cell phone minutes in a long time on my family plan. My daughter did exceed her 250 text allotment a few times, though.

Also, I’m not sure why somebody would use texts to offset minutes for anything but the shortest exchanges. I don’t know how pre-paid plans work, but most contracts include a bunch of anytime minutes, plus free nights/weekends. So the only time texts would save is if you’ve reached your minute limit and are calling during peak times and either have a texting plan or the texts you use will be cheaper than the overage minutes.

For example, overage cell phone minutes cost me $0.45, I believe. If texts cost $0.15 each sent/received, any message longer than 160 characters would get split into two and a reply acknowledging my text would break even. Anything more than would make texts more expensive than a minute of calling time. I think I could get my message out using voice in a minute or so.

Also, I assume that anybody who does significant texting already has a text plan in place to cover their typical usage, so raising individual text message costs would only hit those who text infrequently (and therefore it wouldn’t be a lot of money extra) or those who go over their texting limit.

Finally, if this increase is to offset a loss in revenue from calling minutes, all a consumer has to do if it gets too expensive is switch to an unlimited texting plan. That will cap their losses.

Steve

I’m just thinking that people are relying more on txt messages as a cheaper alternative than burning their cell minutes and the providers are seeing a drop in income… especially as they sell their plans based on lower cost minutes/bulk minute plans

Now that most (if not all) phones allow texting, and many allow data, I’m hoping we’ll see reasonably priced unified plans in the future. (And, my pet peeve, including a data option in family plans.)

Steve