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thavoice
Posts: 14,376
Jan 23, 2014 10:58am
True.sherm03;1571110 wrote:With the new direction that carriers are taking with their phone pricing, you are going to see insurance prices taking a complete nose dive. People aren't going to have a choice soon, and plans like Verizon's EDGE, AT&T's NEXT, and Sprint's One Up will be the only options for purchasing phones. Since people are spreading the full retail cost on their bills, most people would be smart to opt out of the insurance since you're able to upgrade every 12 months instead of every 18-24.
The only thing driving insurance prices right now is Asurion's agreements with carriers to sell the product. Every rep in store has certain targets they have to reach and have to attach insurance to a certain percentage of sales (depending on the area and the carrier, it could be as high as 70%). But with the focus from management switching to making sure people end up on EDGE or NEXT, insurance metrics get pushed to the back burner.
When I was in the business the whole idea was to sell an average of $25 ABOVE the rate plan for each phone sold so you tried to get everything imagineable and at times they wanted you to use less than honorable intentions to get to that mark. Insurance was an easy sell most of the time, but the company nor the employee every got compensated for that feature so that was always the last thing to try and sell since there wasnt anything for the business/employee.
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gut
Posts: 15,058
Jan 23, 2014 11:07am
It may make the cost of the insurance more obvious, but the carriers aren't giving anything away. You only get to upgrade after 12 months if you turn in a working, good condition phone. If you lose your phone or bust it (which is why most people buy insurance) you're going to have to go into pocket for that remaining 50% you haven't paid.sherm03;1571110 wrote:People aren't going to have a choice soon, and plans like Verizon's EDGE, AT&T's NEXT, and Sprint's One Up will be the only options for purchasing phones. Since people are spreading the full retail cost on their bills, most people would be smart to opt out of the insurance since you're able to upgrade every 12 months instead of every 18-24.