Cellphone Portability

[tcarroll]

Alright, I am very angry with cellular providers right now. I purchased a Treo-650 off e-bay. Advertised as brand new (it is) and works on Earthlink and Sprint.

As you already know, Earthlink will not release the ESN so Sprint can activate the phone. When asked why, Earthlink said they do not do that because they would lose money on the phone. I then asked what they would do if I was a customer who had completed my two year service contract with Earthlink and then decided to go with Sprint, would my phone ESN then be released so I could use it with Sprint? I was told no. Once Earthlink enters an ESN, the phone is essentially theirs for life is what I got from that conversation.

This is like me buying a new phone for my house from Hawaii Telcom, then when I move to California, that it would not work on Southwestern Bell's system because Hawaii Telcom has some proprietary code on my phone.

I think the cell phone companys want you to have to buy a new phone so they can make more money off you because you would then have to carry a contract, unless you wanted to pay full retail prices for their products.

Am I way off base here, or should this be a class-action lawsuit to stop these companies from forcing us to play by their rules?

Tom

[alex_mathews]

The carriers subsidize the phone for new customers because they know they'll make the money back and more when you're their customer.

The ESN locking is an interesting way to enforce this, because the CDMA carriers also do 1 or 2 year contracts to keep you around. The GSM carriers do the same type of thing with locking the phone to a carrier specific SIM card and contracts.

I agree that it shouldn't be that difficult, but it's like this purely because of the business model of all the carriers. At least that's my view of things in the US.