Carrier Wrap: U.S. Cellular improves customer metrics, financials dip

Editor’s Note: Wireless operators are a busy bunch, and as such RCR Wireless News will attempt to gather some of the important announcements that may slip through the cracks from the world’s largest carriers in a weekly wrap-up. Enjoy!
–Regional wireless operator U.S. Cellular showed significant operating improvements during the second quarter, trimming net customer losses and improving churn.
The carrier said it lost 30,000 subscribers during the second quarter, a sharp improvement compared with the 127,000 customers lost during the second quarter of last year. The most recent net losses included 26,000 customers from its postpaid services and 4,000 net customer losses from its prepaid operations. U.S. Cellular ended the second quarter with 4.653 million customers, or roughly 315,000 customers less than at mid-2013.
The overall quarterly improvements were bolstered by an increase in gross customer additions from 242,000 subscribers last year to 255,000 customers this year, as well as a drop in customer churn. Postpaid churn improved from 2% to 1.7% year-over-year, while prepaid churn dropped from 6.8% to 6.5%.
Average revenue per user surged from $50.60 during the second quarter of last year to $53.36 this year, with both postpaid and prepaid services showing strong growth.
However, the smaller customer base offset the ARPU gains, with total operating revenues dropping 4% year-over-year to $957.8 million during the second quarter. On the other side of the ledger, expenses increased 30%, which resulted in a net loss of $19.5 million for the latest quarter compared with a gain of $143.7 million last year.
–T-Mobile US trumped its rivals in the most recent J.D. Power customer care survey, while its MetroPCS subsidiary did the same across the prepaid space.
The “2014 U.S. Wireless Customer Care Performance Study – Vol. 2,” had T-Mobile US scoring 792 points on a 1,000-point scale, just nipping runner-up AT&T Mobility’s score of 788 among postpaid-focused carriers. Verizon Wireless was No. 3 with 772 points – and just below the survey average of 776 points – with Sprint coming in a distant No. 4 with 748 points.

The results differed from the survey’s Vol. 1 results, which was conducted during the second half of last year and had AT&T Mobility at the No. 1 position with 806 points. That survey had Sprint at No. 2 with 797 points, followed by T-Mobile US at No. 3 with 796 points and Verizon Wireless at No. 4 with 792 points.
Among prepaid operations, MetroPCS scored 741 points, just ahead of Sprint’s Virgin Mobile USA operations with 733 points. Cricket, which was recently acquired by AT&T through its purchase of Leap Wireless, was No. 3 in the survey with 721 points, with Tracfone Wireless’ branded service at No. 4 with 720 points. Sprint’s Boost Mobile brand came in at No. 5 in the survey with 718 points, followed at No. 6 and No. 7 by Tracfone’s Straight Talk (684 points) and Net10 (667 points) brands.

The Vol. 1 survey had Boost Mobile topping the list with 798 points, followed by MetroPCS with 788 points and Virgin Mobile USA at No. 3 with 786 points.
J.D. Power noted that the Vol. 2 survey was based on responses from 6,131 postpaid and 2,518 prepaid wireless customers through the first six months of this year.
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