Carrier adds 33 new destinations to Open World program, which offers unlimited voice and text, among other features
On the heels of a major expansion by T-Mobile US of its international roaming services, Sprint on Sept. 17 announced a similar expansion that added 33 new destinations to the Sprint Open World roaming package.
Sprint initially rolled out Open World in August following competing moves from T-Mobile US and AT&T. The Sprint Open World service first included various roaming services in 34 countries, with the biggest hook being free access to 1 gigabyte of 3G data for customers traveling in Mexico, Canada, the Dominican Republic, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama and Paraguay. Those customers also receive unlimited voice calling and text messaging in those countries. After the 1 GB of 3G data is used, customers can purchase additional gigabytes for $30, which is billed in kilobyte increments.
Now Sprint has added 33 additional destinations to the plan. The new Open World areas include France, Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, Bonaire, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Curacao, Dominica, Fiji, Gibraltar, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, Montserrat, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Seychelles, St. Barthelemy, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, St. Vincent & The Grenadines, Suriname, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos Islands and Vanuatu.
“When our customers are vacationing in the Caribbean or traveling abroad, we know they want to be able to communicate with friends and family free from worry about surprising costs to text, make a call home or send a photo,” Kevin Crull, chief marketing officer for Sprint, said. “We are continuing to add more destinations and enabling our customers to stay connected virtually wherever they go.”
T-Mobile US, also on Sept. 17, added 20 countries to its Simple Global international roaming service, bringing the total to 145 countries where customers can access free text messaging, data and low-cost calling from their mobile device.
The program, initially launched in late 2013 as part of T-Mobile US’ Un-carrier 3.0 initiative, is said to now cover all of Europe and South America. The carrier noted the expansion pushed overall coverage to “more than 90% of the trips Americans take abroad each year.”
The Simple Global service is included for T-Mobile US Simple Choice postpaid customers. T-Mobile US claims customers are using 140 times more data abroad, global texting is up more than tenfold and customers are making more than six times as many voice calls since the service launched.
The expansion comes on the heels of T-Mobile US’ “Mobile without Borders” service launch in July, which offers most postpaid and prepaid customers free access to place calls, send text messages and access data services in Canada and Mexico by tapping into their rate plans at no extra cost. The data access includes LTE speeds where available, and customers can also place calls from the U.S. to all numbers in Canada and Mexico for no extra cost on qualifying plans. Those not on qualifying plans are charged $10 per month to access the roaming option.
