Competition is getting serious and that means prices are going... up? Well, they are in some states as major telcos are exploiting proof of increasing competition to give them pricing flexibility, which in some cases they are using to raise prices. A story in the USA Today today (I'll love saying that) reports on how AT&T and Verizon have sharply increased prices for some calling features, such as caller ID.
Competition is supposed to encourage customer-friendly markets, but if incumbents have figured out a better way to make money and capture customers, they can turn the logic of more competition/lower pricing on its head.
The new logic is that if you don't like high individual feature prices, then you can instead buy a service bundle which allows you not to worry about the disturbing math involved in ordering special features ala carte. You can instead get multiple services at a price lower overall than you would pay for services individually--because haven't you heard the prices for individual feature are going up? Whether or not you wanted multiple services from the same provider is immaterial.
If you don't get that logic, you can buy from someone else. These telcos only want the customers who understand it.
- Dan
For more:
- check out this story in USA TodayÂ