Coming next year: Ting, the less-evil mobile carrier
Cellular carriers are evil. — Or dumb. Because what but an evil or dumb company would punish its best customers for underestimating the amount of their product that they want? Cellular overage charges are insultingly high.
Context & Ripple Effects
Ting's 2012 launch is the latest move in a long-running revolt against wireless pricing. As far back as 2007, the cellphone straitjacket was inspiring a rebellion against locked-down plans, and carriers were already fearing a mobile VoIP planet that would route around their tolls.
First-order effects
- Incumbent carriers face a direct challenger whose entire brand is built on abolishing overage fees, forcing them to defend the most-hated line item on the bill.
- Customers who routinely underestimate monthly usage gain a carrier option where misjudging demand stops being a penalty event.
Second-order effects
- With SMS revenue already under pressure from free texting apps, incumbents can less afford to lean on overage charges as a profit center, accelerating a shift toward flat or tiered pricing.
- Ting's model demonstrates that an MVNO renting incumbent network capacity can compete on billing fairness rather than coverage, inviting more entrants to do the same.
Third-order effects
- If fair-usage billing proves viable on rented capacity, the industry splits into network owners selling wholesale access and brand-layer carriers competing on customer treatment — weakening the incumbents' control over the retail relationship.
- A sustained backlash against punitive fees points toward regulatory and market scrutiny of overage pricing as a structural feature rather than an accepted norm.
The trend: Consumer anger at punitive wireless pricing is spawning challengers that ride incumbent networks to undercut the fee structure itself.