This post is an update for fellow stubborn folks still clinging to the Sprint SERO plan. This grandfathered plan gave us individual plans with 500 minutes, nights starting at 7pm, unlimited text, and unlimited data for $30 a month. However, this was with severe restrictions on available phones. In 2010, Sprint announced SERO Premium which allowed us to upgrade to Android or Blackberry phones for $10 a month, and another $10 a month for “high data use” smartphones like the ones capable of 4G data.
Yes, the new iPhone 4S (and iPhone 4) is available on the SERO Premium plan for $50 a month. The 500 minute plan will cost $30 + $10 +$10 = $50 a month, because it is also “high data use” even though it’s not 4G-capable. For a while, the swamped Sprint CSRs were not well-trained in this area and were giving conflicting information. But customer-friendly Sprint executive Russ McGuire has confirmed the $50 price on his personal blog, and it has been ordered successfully in various cell phone forums. Looks like it’s time for an upgrade. 🙂
Never heard of SERO? You can still get the cheapest iPhone 4S plan available to the public at for $69.99 a month, including unlimited data and text messages, through the Sprint Employee referral program.
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How about SERO family plan. ANY information on that?
I to have been on the SERO $30 plan for many year. Last week just upgraded to the $50 plan and purchased the Motorola Photon 4g. So far i am very happy with this phone and the 4g speed.
Jonathan,
For current $30 SERO plan sprint users, do you know what is the cheapest Sero-Premium family plan with 2 lines with iphone4S ?
>>>stubborn folks <<<
Yeah!! I am one of them !
Hi Jonathan,
Two questions:
(1). the SERO Premium has new features like unlimited any mobile to mobile (not just within Sprint mobiles), also it offers free GPS features if your phone supports it;
(2). You mentioned “high data use” even though it’s not 4G-capable. I am confused of that. Did you mean that for SERO Premium, though one could have a 4G-capable phone like iPhone, HTC EVO, etc, however when you really use the phone within the SERO Premium network, it’s not a “real” 4G network, and so the performance will be downgraded compared to the real 4G network, is my understanding correct ?
Thanks in advance.
I don’t know that SERO Premium has a family option. I think the only two options are 500 minutes for $40 and 1250 minutes for $60. Plus $10 for any “fancy” phones like Evo, Epic, and iPhone. This is called Premium Data add-on.
All 4G phones also get charged the $10 Premium data, and work on the Sprint 4G network. iPhone 4S is not a 4G phone. But it does charge the extra $10 per month as Sprint has expanded the $10 Premium data add on to include any phone that tends to use a lot of data.
Sprint is absolutely horrid in the SF Bay Area and most of NYC. Then again, ATT in the Bay Area has almost as poor coverage. Fortunately I’m on a contract free prepaid, I look forward to switching over to T-mobile as soon as their $30/mo plan prepaid plan goes live.
Unfortunately, no 3G data with the iPhone 4 on T-mobile, but for iPhone fanatics, it’s an option at 2G at $30/mo
So till now no any iPhone is a 4G phone ! I am a little bit surprised to learn that. Is 4G network much faster than 3G? If so, does that mean 4G phones (like HTC Evo, etc) run much faster than iPhone cause the latter is only 3G ?
Jonathan,..I always thought there was a SERO-premium family plan. But may be you are right, I cannot find any details on Sero-P family plan. Would have been nice to have like a 1000 minutes SERO-P family plan for $80 with iphone4S.
I have an original SERO plan. If I want to get the iPhone 4s, how would I do it? Can I do it online or do I have to call in or go to a store? iPhone 4s preorder is sold out right now, but if I select something like LG Optimus S, it says, “Plans for this phone require our $10/mo. Premium Data add-on charge in addition to one of the plans below.” None of the plan is what I want.
It also says ,”After you receive your new phone, you can activate it online. If you don’t already have one of the data plans we offer today, you’ll need to select one of the data plans listed above when you activate your phone.
Please note: If you switch from a plan we no longer offer, and for some reason you decide to go back to your old phone, please be aware that you won’t be able to switch back to your old plan. However, you will be able to switch to other plans we currently offer.”. This scares me, looks like I might loose my SERO plan. I have no problem going to the SERO Premium + $10 premium data (total $50 a month). But it is not clear from their website.
Still on the $30/month plan. Definitely gonna upgrade soon, and it’s between this, the Galaxy SII, or the Nexus Prime (which I’m starting to hear is only going to Verizon, which I really hope isn’t the case since it’s the phone I most likely will want).
One thing worth mentioning is that the minutes on sprint are essentially unlimited, even if it’s technically 500, because they let you have unlimited mobile-to-mobile with ANY CARRIER. So if you call your buddy who has verizon, that’s not using any of the 500 minutes. M2M isn’t just limited to Sprint mobile phones, and I think its the only carrier that does that.
Hi Brent212, I don’t think the $30 SERO plan is unlimited mobile to mobile(any carrier), but I think SERO Premium is unlimited mobile to mobile (any carrier), plus free GPS as long as your phone has GPS feature. Jonathan could you confirm ?
The differences between SERO and SERO Premium are that Premium has the addition of Any Mobile Anytime and Unlimited GPS Navigation. Basically the SERO Premium plans are meant to match up with the current “Everything Plus” plans of Sprint. Source:
http://community.sprint.com/baw/thread/42978?featured=true
Looks like the cheapest iPhones are sold out, but the ones with more memory are still available for preorder. It’s interesting that the “old” iPhone 4 is also available for $99, I wonder if they even had to change it much to work with Sprint. Likely not, it was just a money issue that Verizon paid for CDMA exclusivity.
Alex, yeah, that’s what I meant. Since no one can get the $30 plan anymore I thought that went without saying.
I opened my first phone few years back in ’08 with sprint because of the SERO $30 plan. My friends were paying $60 while i was paying half for the same service, if anything…i was getting more features.
Now they added $10 more for Blackberry Internet Service (BIS) since i upgraded from Nextel phone to B.B. Tour. So now im at $40/month.
With any 4G phone we get, it adds additional $10/mo making it a total of $50/mo. It still a good deal. But its like we are getting forced to pay upgrade from the $30 to $50/mo because of the phone options.
Seems like Sprint used the $30 SERO to lure in new potential customers make us pay $20 more to get the good phones over the next few years. At first they dont make money from us, then with all of the $20/mo extra, they will benefit. Very strategic move from sprint and I like how they did it on the down low. They didnt advertise it, but instead through it online for all the “stubborn” ppl like me lol .
Im planning on getting the BB 9930 over the iPhone 4s because of the email features and the physical keyboard and uniquness of the B.B. 9930.
I loved the Tour but everything it was missing that i needed was brought with the 9930 so I really want it.
I was thinking to buy the 9930 from a local store full price to use it until December 2011 when I am qualified for a full upgrade. Then if I decided not to keep the 9930, I can use my full upgrade to get the iPhone 4s.
Most likely im going to keep the B.B 9930 cuz it just fits me really good.
We shall see what goes on.
To NM,
You’ll have to call and upgrade your SERO to the $40 premium SERO plan first. After that, you order the phone and activate it when you get it. Ignore the prompts about it not working with your plan.
PS: You can also call to revert to $30 SERO in the future if you want
You can count me among the “stubborn” SERO users. I even opted for a HTC Touch Pro 2 with crappy WinMo 6.1 (HTC’s WinMo 6.5 was worse) rather than upgrade to SERO Premium and get an early Android phone.
Now that my contract is running out, I was thinking of a current-gen Android, but then the iPhone 4S was announced for Sprint. Yippee! Pre-ordered the 4S first thing Friday morning.
They didn’t make me choose, nor make it easy to learn, about the more expensive plan. I’m not sure if it will be $50/mo plus the $10 smartphone fee (formerly known as the 4G fee), or if the smartphone fee is included in the $50/mo.
I’ll find out on Friday, hopefully.
I just wanted to bring up the best plan out there in my opinion. It would be the Tmobile 1500 Talk & Text (with 30MB of data) in their Monthly 4G Prepaid plan for $30. There have some decent android no-contract phones out there for purchase.. best bang for the buck..
$50 for the iPhone is waaay cheaper than what AT&T was charging when I last looked.
I so want to switch out of my HTC Pro 2 Touch but my plan isn’t up until May. Paying full price for an iPhone isn’t worth it. But it’s good to know it will be there when I’m ready.
Vivek,..can one use an unlocked iphone 4 or 4S with the t-mobile plan you mentioned for $30 monthly?
@VIVEK: I’m also interested in the T-mobile $30 (unlimited talk and text) , do confirm if this plan will work on the new iPhone 4S?
Let me know.
Hey guys, i have a question, I have the old Sero 500 for 30 dollars. I just checked my eligibility and it says that i have 150 available for upgrade. Does this mean that if i upgrade to Sero P, I can get the iphone for 200 dollars?
I tried to order it with the current plan, and it wouldnt go throught.
Also, how is the TEP insurance going to work with the iphone? will we countinue to pay the monthly 8 dollars and 100 deductible?
Jonathan,
Did you get and activate iphone 4S with sero-premium? Can you please tell what was the total charge, did you get activation fees waived and received any contract signing credit ? Thanks MM.
Right now I have no upgrade credit. It says in 194 days I’ll have $150 upgrade credit. But the surprising thing is that when I go to upgrade currently, the iphones appear on the site as costing $649 (for the 16 GB model) to $849 (for 64 GB). That can’t be correct, right? Even when I’m eligible for the $150 upgrade credit the 16 GB model will be $500. How are people getting these for 200 bucks? No way I’m paying $500 for a phone, especially with only 16 GB of storage.
How much is SEROP family plan
Tried to activate my iphone this morning and just saw on my account page that they changed my plan to “everything plus”, which is $60/month. Gonna have to fix this…
My wife forgot her phone on the car and it fell down. Tire passed over it and now the phone is scratched up, more problematically the battery is badly damaged (does not hold charge fir too long). I went to a sprint store recently. She is eligible for an upgrade – as is out of her 2 year contract. What is the best phone to upgrade to without having to pay through the nose. She uses it mostly just for phone calls only
Anyone recently switched from sero to sero-premium plan? Is it worth waiting for 6 months for iphone5 in Spet/Oct you think,..instead of getting iphone 4S now? Jonathan,..what do you suggest?
@MM – It’s your personal decision, I have an iPhone now and I definitely get more utility out of it than my old TP2. I have no idea what the iPhone 5 will offer.
Hi, I have no luck with the Sero-P plan, each time I talked with a representative or chat with them is No answer. I have now the Sero 500 minutes $59.99 + $10.00 for data for smartphones. I create the account on april 27, 2012. No luck for me. Any more idea?
I love the allure of the newer smart phones and even the iphone 4S but still can seem to make the leap yet. The $30 a month is still too appealing for me. With that being stated, anyone know of a list of phones or recommend a good smart type phone I can get now that will work with the current $30 500 min plan? I appreciate the feedback!
@bill I am in the same situation for over a year & after checking around, the phones for the $30 and $50 sero plans just suck. People selling TP2 still want what I consider more than the phone is worth. All the othesr are over 2-5 years old at least. Just hope the IP5 is something that is worth losing my (original) sero. lol Sure you have the galaxy S3, and a few others, but still holding on…
Crazy right?
Jonathan,
Do you know of anyway to buy sprint iphone5 for $199 and avoiding the activation fees? I tried bestbuy,but they say that they can’t access sprint sero accounts. I am still on old sero plan.
@MM – Did you try a Sprint store? Or maybe just call Sprint directly to get on SERO Premium. If you’re already on Sprint, why do you need pay activation?
I got my iPhone 5 through Telesales which handles the SERO phone sales. Here’s their number: Telesales (888-882-4030)
I didn’t have an activation fee. Also, when you call to order make sure you ask them to take off the shipping fee. Let them know if you order through Apple the shipping is free. They should be able to take that fee off.
Thanks Glen and Jonathan. When I called sprint-sero customer service last week, they mentioned I would be charged activation fees on upgrade from sero to iphone5.
Will try tele-sales. I was preferring bestbuy as I had a bestbuy gift card. But looks like bestbuy not able to access sero accounts.
Glen,..how soon did you receive your iphone5 from tele-sales. You activating the iphone by calling sprint sero customer service?
MM – I ordered the iPhone the first day I was able before 2PM CST. I received it a week later, Sept 21st I think. I activated it through Sprint.
Thanks Glen.
I remember my first post I made on this blog exactly last year on October 9th, 2011. (Scroll Up and See)
I though I’d contribute to this blog again with my experience. I want to say I am still a Blackberry fan ;). I have the BB 9930 and loving it.
On April 2012 my contract was over with, but I refused to sign a contract again without getting any benefit from sprint. So I called them and after negotiating with the Supervisor, I was able to receive a $70 credit on my account for signing the contract for additional 2 years. I still have my $150 Upgrade. So September came with the iPhone 5 and I laughed at ppl who got it because its the same just bigger screen.
Samsung Galaxy SIII is its biggest competition because the BB9930 is not fighting for the top right now. However, in January 2013, Blackberry 10 will be announced to the public. Its a new platform OS that Blackberry has been building for well over a year. Its filled with futuristic technology thats crazy. The camera is beyond legit, keyboard is very user friendly, the “flow” technology will be its reason for success.
If you have a upgrade and really looking for “The Next Big Thing”, Just keep the phone you have now and be patient until the beginning of next year. The Blackberry 10 device will be the best of the best. Its going to be the first Superphone.
God loves those who are patient so just wait and you’ll be rewarded. Put it this way, the Galaxy SIII will be considered ancient while the iPhone 5 will looking for Steve Jobs in the graves. Blackberry is finally here to take over and they will not disappoint you. They recently got a new CEO who changed everything.
Just do your research on Google, Youtube, Crackberry, etc and you’ll see what im talking about.
SERO + Blackberry 10 = My Money Blog
Did anyone consider or tried Samsung Note 2 for sprint sero premium?