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Sprint will finally be joining the likes of AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon with pro-rated early termination fees (EFTs).  The final details have still not yet been announced, but according to Chief Executive Dan Hesse, customers may be seeing the pro-rated fees as early as December.  Which means that customers who cancel their contract early will not always be stuck with that $200 fee, instead the ETF will be based on how much of the initial contract is still left.

At this point pro-rated early termination fees seem like a natural option to have, of course this news from Sprint comes with little surprise considering the other major carriers have already been doing this.  Stay subscribed, as Sprint releases more details on the new ETF’s we will be sure to let you know.

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As expected, AT&T has officially begun offering the new pro-rated Early Termination Fee (ETF) schedule. In news that was announced back in early April, these new fees went into effect as of May 25 and allow for a little lower price should you decide to skip out of you contract earlier than they would like.

In the past customers would have had to shell out a flat fee of $175, but now you will save $5 per month. This means that with a small amount of time left on your contract you will be able to get out fairly cheaply, assuming you have 6-months remaining you will be charged just $85, where in the past it would have been the full $175.

While this new ETF schedule comes as welcome news, we do have a nice warning for any current customers—this may not apply. That is until your renew your current contract, which would mean that you would start fresh at that 2-year mark again, which at least for another month keep you at that $175 cancellation level, but the good news is that it will only get cheaper from there. So while this news may not help everyone immediately, it is still more than welcome, hopefully the remaining carriers will follow suit.

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The FCC is taking a new look at the Cell Phone Consumer Empowerment Act. The act, passed in September of last year, is looking to implement a pro-rated early termination fee system. In such a system, the amount of the ETF would depend on how much of the customers contract has been completed at the time of cancellation. Until recently most providers have charged a flat $200 fee. Sprint and AT&T are already offering such a pro-rated fee structure, and T-Mobile has announced plans to do the same. The act is also asking the FCC to order cell phone providers to allow customers 30 days or 10 days after their first bill to cancel with no fee, however most carriers already offer this.

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Cellular South, currently available for customers in along the Alabama and Florida Panhandle coast line is looking to attract new subscribers. In a new promotion they are offering to pay any early termination fee that you may be charged by your current provider should you decide to leave. Sounds great, assuming you were unhappy with your current carrier and happened to live in the limited area that they cover. There are a few strings attached but nothing horrible, the credit is limited to $200 and they will not be paying you cash, the money goes towards your future bills with Cellular South. Aside from those few details, there was not any mention of how long this offer would be available.

While this offer will not apply to many of our readers, it does bring an interesting point that if a smaller cellular company is willing (and able) to pay termination fees from other providers how necessary they really are for the bigger guys. I mean they must be making enough even without them, of course without early termination fees we are likely to see prices of phones go up and subsidized models decrease in availability. Hopefully some of the larger carriers will take note and begin to further change their ETF policies.

Read [Cellular South] Via [Phone Scoop]

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It appears AT&T has heard the cries of consumers not wanting to be committed to a contract. Therefore, the company has announced that it is revamping their Early Termination Fee (ETF) policy beginning May 25th for new and renewing AT&T customers. Instead of paying the flat fee of $175 to drop out of their contract, the new policy will begin to prorate ETFs by $5 for each remaining month on the contract. So, if you’ve been eyeing that shiny new phone and have a few more months remaining, getting out of your current contract just got a whole lot sweeter.

The new policy change follows Verizon’s decision to being prorating their ETFs, which they began doing so back in 2006. Sprint and T-Mobile are said to follow suit.

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