Costco Bringing Back Fan-Favorite Product To Its Stores
Costco cut ties with its former cell phone provider, Wireless Advocates LLC, and is now partnering with T-Mobile to offer cell phone services to customers at approximately 30% of Costco locations nationwide.
Last month, both Costco employees and customers were shocked when they entered the store and found that the warehouse cell phone kiosks were shuttered at locations all around the country. Wireless Advocates LLC, who had an agreement with the big box retailer to sell cell phone services and products left shoppers wondering whether they would need to seek alternative options in the future to meet their cell phone servicing and product needs. Costco answered that question this week when they revealed that Costco has inked a deal with T-Mobile to be the provider in 30 percent of all Costco locations nationwide.
At the time of Wireless Advocates LLC’s disappearance from all Costco locations, it was theorized that Costco was looking to move away from having third-party cell servicing companies selling their wares at their locations. The thought was that the retailer was instead moving forward with the service provider companies themselves.
However, according to a T-Mobile disclosure, which was reported by EatThis, “there are other Costco locations where AT&T is the current exclusive cell service provider, so it is possible that these companies are vying for exclusive rights across all of Costco’s locations.” T-Mobile has announced some of the details of its offerings that will be available to cell phone shoppers at Costco locations.
T-Mobile will be offering to waive its regular $35 device connection fee when customers sign up at a Costco location. Additionally, the cell giant is adding a 90-day return window for all purchases (which is a full two months longer than the return window that you are given when you purchase from their own T-Mobile retail stores).
However, at this time, T-Mobile will only be offering what is known as ship-to services, which means that if you were to sign up and purchase new phones at the warehouse locations, they would ship the product directly to your home, and won’t have phones available for in-store pickups.
Another bit of good news being reported by T-Mobile is that Costco Business member might soon be able to handle their accounts through T-Mobile kiosks as well, but the exact details and extent of that servicing is still waiting for clarification from the company. This could be a huge relief to those business customers that utilize the Costco warehouse locations for supplies and can take care of mobile needs as well. This was not an option previously with Wireless Advocates LLC., and any time that a business owner can complete two tasks in the same place, it saves the company time and money.
Currently, we can say to all the fans of Costco having the ability to take care of cell phone services, that they do not need to worry anymore about where they will get their next phone or servicing contract because Costco will have them covered. We will have to wait and see which cellular service provider Costco can hammer out an agreement with on a more overarching and lengthy deal within the coming months.
