00:00 Julie
Jeff, thanks for being here.
00:02 Jeff
Hey, Julie. How you doing?
00:03 Julie
I’m doing well. Thank you. And you guys did see an increase in your wireless subscribers because of those promotions that you were running. But I’m just curious, as you look at this sort of price competitive landscape right now, how long do you expect these sort of price wars to last? Is it just the new normal now?
00:18 Jeff
Well, I think this industry has been always competitive and comes from somebody who’s been in it for 30 years now since the very beginning of the wireless industry. And we fair really well, um, in the competitive, uh, marketplace. Um, we’ve got a track record of doing that. I think what’s important, Julie, is in the third quarter, yet again is another proof point that AT&T’s investment led strategy to build America’s most advanced communications network is paying off. I mean, we recorded 550,000, uh, broadband net additions on our fiber and our fixed wireless network, setting the best ever in eight years of, uh, broadband net ad growth. And to your point, we did add over 400,000 high-quality postpaid subscribers.
01:05 Jeff
When it comes to price wars, I think what’s really important and what we’re here to talk about today is, um, we’re launching a new campaign, uh, based on feedback that we’ve received from customers, uh, all across the nation that, uh, the truth’s got to come out. The price wars and the misperceptions and all of the distractions. And in some cases, a lot of deception in, uh, that of our competitor T-Mobile in their quote- unquote price locks, which have historically had a lot of loopholes in it that they take advantage of. Um, and and so our campaign that we launched today is on behalf of all consumers, uh, trying to set the record straight about who’s got, uh, the right level of network performance that customers deserve at the right price, uh, that provides the right value and is backed up by a level of service that they deserve.
01:54 Julie
Jeff, this is a new tactic for you guys. Um, you know, talking about your competitors a little bit more directly by name. Historically it was Team Mobile that was kind of sassy in that in that department. Um, what what led to this sort of change in strategy in terms of sort of calling them out by name and talking about that?
02:22 Jeff
Well, I mean, you know, AT&T, we’ve been around for 150 years and we have a way of doing things. Uh, we believe in transparency, uh, we believe in providing a high degree of reliability for services that all Americans really do depend on. This is really important work for us. We take this job very seriously. It’s why we invest more than any other player in the market to build the nation’s best networks. And in fact, you know, when we see claims coming directly, uh from a competitor like T-Mobile with advertising that says they’ve got more towers leading people to believe that they may have the absolute largest and best network, the opposite couldn’t be truer.
03:00 Jeff
In fact, T-Mobile’s got the smallest network. Over 300,000 square miles smaller than that of AT&T. We own and operate the largest, most reliable wireless network and you know, when you’re working in a in an industry for as long as we are and you’re seeing a competitor who repeatedly is getting corrected by the Better Business Bureau’s advertising watchdog 16 times across four years. That’s one correction per quarter. Enough’s enough. It’s time for somebody to speak out uh on behalf of consumers.
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