For the past 36 months my family and I have been Bell Mobility customers paying our bills faithfully and on time.  Our accounts are current and it’s time to renew.  We spend a minimum of $120 a month for a family plan of 3 subscribers.

Like any self respecting value conscious price shopper, I began looking around for the best deal.  Now that I can take my cell phone number to any carrier, we’re not particularly interested in one company over another.  As long as the deal is good, we’ll go for the best value. Hype about who’s network is best is just hype to us, we just want to communicate for the best price.

Having studied marketing at college in the past, I am well aware that traditional wisdom says that the cost of acquiring a customer is higher than retaining one.  I’m very surprised that the high paid executives at Bell have ignored this tenet.

Bell and other carriers offer handset upgrade credits at the end of every contract which is where my issue lies.  Ma Bell has offered us $200 to upgrade each of our 3 handsets if we commit to another 3 year deal.  That’s not bad, certainly better than a kick in the pants.

Upon closer investigation though, the deal is no deal at all.

As new customers, we would be rewarded for our business with a reasonable credit for a new handset.  Our price for buying a new iPhone 3Gs 16 GB model would be $99 for the handset if we were new customers.  As existing loyal customers, however, we would have to pay $399.95 on a 3 year deal for the same phone – FOUR times the price!

As someone involved in the industry, I am aware that Bell would recoup the $200 handset subsidy they are offering us within 4 months.  Even if they offered us the full $600 subsidy, they would recover the subsidy in 12 months.

As existing customers we also do not qualify for sign up bonuses like free local calling for 3 months or a bag of candy or anything else.

Given the lack of incentive to remain faithful customers I’m gonna do what my momma told me and shop around.

Maybe you should too.

** UPDATE **

I called in to cancel our three phones and it turns out that if I sign another 3 year term I can get an iPhone 3Gs 32GB model for $149 instead of the price advertised online.  Of course, it only took 1 hour on the phone with the representative attempting to get me to sign on for another 3 years for the other phones before that deal was offered.  I understand the concept of upselling and cross-selling but this was beyond ridiculous.

After repeating that we no longer had a need for the three phones the rep offered to convert the existing 3 year old phones into prepaid ones – for a small fee of $50 each! It’s no wonder there is so much waste when anyone can go into their local Zellers or Wal Mart and pick up a new prepaid phone from any carrier for as little as $40 sometimes – with some airtime credits too.| The major carriers don’t seem to want to admit it but what they are selling now is like margarine and butter – some people swear that one tastes better than the other but to most of us when it comes down to it we can live with one or the other.  *shrug*

After standing my ground I was asked to try and find someone else to take over the ending plans since they were working phones and I thought to myself “Isn’t that your job?”

I eventually caved and agreed to renew the main line of the contract for 3 years on the provision that they give me the full upgrade credit towards the iPhone 3Gs 32GB model.  They agreed and “gave” me an OK plan which will add up to triple the value of the phone.

In the end though the joke is on me – after shopping around all afternoon Saturday I learned that the 3Gs 32GB model is sold out everywhere.  Guess I’ll be using my recycled phone a while longer… not that  there’s anything wrong with that