T-Mobile and its rock star CEO John Legere wasted no time in jumping on Apple’s bandwagon, announcing on Thursday the expected arrival of the iPhone 6s to the carrier’s stable, but also surprising Twitter followers by confirming that the company will also carry the Apple Watch, though it did not announce a formal date for sales to begin for the wearable device. T-Mobile is also strengthening its customer satisfaction guarantee, and offering substantial savings on the cost of an iPhone 6s through its Jump On Demand installment-plan option.
The iPhone 6s and 6s Plus will also make for an improved experience for T-Mobile customers in 170 US markets currently, thanks to the devices’ support of the 700MHz LTE Band 12, which T-Mobile uses for what it calls “Extended Range” LTE, said to extend the signal twice as far from towers, and offers four times better signal strength in buildings. The improved LTE service is already live in areas covering half of the US population, and the company expects to have it in 350 markets by the end of 2015.
Extended Range LTE Map by end of 2015
Yes! We’ll have #AppleWatch @tmobile. Who wants one?? #appleevent
— John Legere (@JohnLegere) September 9, 2015
“For as long as you use your iPhone 6s or 6s Plus on T-Mobile, if you aren’t completely satisfied with your coverage experience we’ll refund you for every penny you’ve paid for your new device in the first month, or after that, we’ll unlock it at no charge so you can use it with one of the other wireless companies,” the company announced. “We’ll even refund up to a full month of your service.”
The Jump plan itself offers one of the best available deals on the base iPhone 6s model among carriers: $0 down, with 18 monthly payments of $20 over and above whatever plan users select. At the end of the 18-month agreement, having paid $360 towards the cost of the iPhone itself, users can return the iPhone and pay nothing more on the cost, or pay an additional $164 to own the 6s outright. This represents a total cost of $524, a savings of $125 over the full cost of the base iPhone 6s from Apple. Prices for other models are expected to offer similar savings, but haven’t yet been detailed.
