No, Sprint Wont Throttle Your data — Unless You’re Roaming

January 7, 2012

No, Sprint Wont Throttle Your data -- Unless You're Roaming 4

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Some of you may have heard that Dow Jones Newswire recently claimed that Sprint CEO Dan Hesse said that they throttle the top 1% of data users sending the interwebs into a huge ranting session. Why would Hesse admit to data throttling when they claim to offer unlimited data to its customers? Well, it seems that Dow Jones got their story wrong and misquoted Hesse. As it turns out, while speaking at an investors meeting, Hesse did mention the throttling of data hogs but was referring to those who are roaming while doing so. Sprint customers who are throttled because of roaming account for 1% of the customer base and are, according to the fine print, violating the 300MB limit of off-network data.

Sprint executive Bill White told CNET that “we don't throttle our postpaid customers” and Sprint also posted a blog trying to clear up the misunderstanding:

Sprint does not throttle any postpaid phone data users for on-network or off-network usage. Sprint is the only national carrier offering smartphone users truly unlimited data with no throttling, metering or overages while on the Sprint network.
Sprint does have terms and conditions which prohibit certain types of data use that may impair other customers’ usage or harm or interfere with the network. At yesterday’s investor conference, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse was referring to Sprint’s right to terminate service of data abusers who violate Sprint’s terms and conditions. Customers who abuse our network by violating the terms and conditions will be contacted by Sprint in an effort to have the customer change their usage to comply with their subscriber agreement. Customers who do not change their usage and remain in violation of the terms and conditions may be subject to actions reserved by Sprint, including but not limited to termination. Consistent with our advertising, engaging in such uses will not result in throttling for customers on unlimited data-included plans for phones.

So there you have it. If you are a Sprint customer you can take a chill-pill and continue to consume as much data as you can (as long as you're not roaming). After all, you are paying for what they claim to be the US' only true “unlimited data plan”. Enjoy it. Besides, once they start to rollout their LTE network in mid 2012 you can most likely expect some sort of data plan restructuring. Here's hoping they believe in the grandfather clause.

[via Android Central from Sprint]

Stacy Bruce Author

Stacy Bruce was born and raised in Spokane Washington. He attended the University of Washington to study pre-med only to change his course study a year later to forensic science. Although currently not a doctor or a scientist, some believe he posseses the knowledge of both. He was a resident of San Diego California for ten years, lived beachside and sometimes wonders why the hell he moved back to Spokane. A multi-talented man, Stacy is a fabricator, an artist, a gear head, a tech junkie and at most, the disciple of Casanova. Growing up, he was always enthralled with electronics, gadgets and gizmos. Throughout his life he has had one, if not two, of every cool and new electronic device available. He began his smartphone experience with the original iPhone. After realizing it was more like theirPhone, he decided he wanted the ability to customize, so Stacy moved to the OG Droid and has been a loyal Android fanatic ever since. Moving through all of the top tier Verizon phones, he recently retired his Droid Charge in favor of the Galaxy Nexus, only to wonder what great device Samsung will come out with next. Stacy is a busy new homeowner in where he lives with his beautiful girlfriend and two dogs.