Sprint Follows Other Carriers With Early Upgrade Program

In a move to compete with wireless companies providing less stringent contracts for phone plans, Sprint is offering a program called “One Up,” which allows customers to pay in monthly installments and change their phones once a year.

The new upgrade program, which starts today, gives Sprint customers unlimited talk, text and high speed data plus the ability to upgrade their smartphone every 12 months.  The program comes with an introductory offer of a $15 discount on its Unlimited, My Way, and All-In plans, one of which must be selected for One Up.  Sprint is also sweetening the pot by  offering no money down on the device for a limited time.

As a Sprint subscriber since 1999, I am happy to see the company is finally easing up on its policies, but the company is a little late to the game.  Sprint is actually the last of the four major carriers to offer this type of program, which has consumers pay for their own devices in monthly installments while easing up on contracts.

Sprint claims the news plan, which offers unlimited talk, text, and data for as low as $65, is the lowest price offered among all the major carriers.  T-Mobile offers a similar plan for $70 a month and AT&T and Verizon Wireless both offer early-upgrade and no-contract monthly installment plans.

Still, Sprint is late to the game on this one as well as the 4G LTE rollout.  However, Sprint did say today that it’s projected to provide LTE to 200 million people by the end of 2013.