Churn rates are monthly.

Its a shame that Sprint apologists have to forge names to lamely attempt to
discredit the TRUTH that churn rates are a monthly figure, reported quarterly.

just go to Google, and do a search on

Cellular monthly churn 2003

and see how they lie. 3890 linkas!

Now they need to apologize to those they have attempted to defame

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› See More: Churn rates are monthly.

Nextel has had the lowest churn all this year, and its always listed
as a monthly Churn rate:

http://seattle.bizjournals.com/seatt...8/daily24.html


>Its a shame that Sprint apologists have to forge names to lamely attempt to
>discredit the TRUTH that churn rates are a monthly figure, reported quarterly.
>
>just go to Google, and do a search on
>
>Cellular monthly churn 2003
>
>and see how they lie. 3890 linkas!
>
>Now they need to apologize to those they have attempted to defame

Michael wrote:

> Nextel has had the lowest churn all this year, and its always listed
> as a monthly Churn rate:
>
> http://seattle.bizjournals.com/seatt...8/daily24.html
>
>
>>Its a shame that Sprint apologists have to forge names to lamely attempt
>>to discredit the TRUTH that churn rates are a monthly figure, reported
>>quarterly.
>>
>>just go to Google, and do a search on
>>
>>Cellular monthly churn 2003
>>
>>and see how they lie. 3890 linkas!
>>
>>Now they need to apologize to those they have attempted to defame

First- that was about Nextel PArtners (a totally seperate company).

Second- it reports an average, which is not a true monthly figure. THe
AVERAGE is based on the QUARTER'S numbers.

Scott Stephenson wrote:
> Michael wrote:
>
>
>>Nextel has had the lowest churn all this year, and its always listed
>>as a monthly Churn rate:
>>
>>http://seattle.bizjournals.com/seatt...8/daily24.html
>>
>>
>>
>>>Its a shame that Sprint apologists have to forge names to lamely attempt
>>>to discredit the TRUTH that churn rates are a monthly figure, reported
>>>quarterly.
>>>
>>>just go to Google, and do a search on
>>>
>>>Cellular monthly churn 2003
>>>
>>>and see how they lie. 3890 linkas!
>>>
>>>Now they need to apologize to those they have attempted to defame
>
>
> First- that was about Nextel PArtners (a totally seperate company).
>
> Second- it reports an average, which is not a true monthly figure. THe
> AVERAGE is based on the QUARTER'S numbers.


I have worked in the wireless industry for many, many years;
unfortunately, I am quite familiar with churn. Churn numbers are
virtually always reported as *monthly* percentages (typically 2%-4%).
For the sake of argument, if you assume net zero subscriber growth for a
year period, that equates to 24%-48% annual churn. Granted no carrier
has a net zero growth, but even in an extremely good (bad) year, a
carrier might add (lose) 20%, which will only impact the annual figures
somewhat. As much as I dislike some of the crap Phil posts here, he is
essentially correct regarding the churn percentages. If you're not
convinced, check out this report by the Yankee group at the following link:

http://www.lightbridge.com/files/pdfs/wnp_impact.pdf

and look at the graph on page 5 in particular, which clearly shows the
churn rate to be MONTHLY (at ~2.0-4.0%). And yes, on page 3 is states
that average churn rates for Q1-Q3, for example, will be 2.4-2.7%, but
those are the MONTHLY rates *during* those particular quaters! If you
STILL don't believe it, page 9 states, referring to Hong Kong, "Churn:
2.5% to 3.5% per month" (and HK ain't that much different than the US).

As for the math, if you don't believe that a 3% monthly churn rate
approximately equates to a 36% annual churn rate, follow along:

Let's assume 10M subs on Jan 1, a 24% annual net sub growth, and 3%
monthly churn. The 24% growth means we must have 12.4M subs on Dec 31
(or 200,000 net adds per month).
During Jan, with 10M subs, 300k (3%) are lost to churn (but 500k gross
are added, for a net of 200k -> 10.2M at beginning of Feb).
During Feb, with 10.2M subs, 306k are lost to churn.
During Mar, with 10.4M subs, 312k are lost to churn.
--> stop here for a moment: during Q1, 918k subs were lost to churn.
So for Q1, 918k/10.4M = 8.83% quarterly churn (or slightly less than
3*3%, due to the net sub growth). Continuing...
During Apr, with 10.6M subs, 318k are lost to churn.
During May, with 10.8M subs, 324k are lost to churn.
During Jun, with 11.0M subs, 330k are lost to churn.
During Jul, with 11.2M subs, 336k are lost to churn.
During Aug, with 11.4M subs, 342k are lost to churn.
During Sep, with 11.6M subs, 348k are lost to churn.
During Oct, with 11.8M subs, 354k are lost to churn.
During Nov, with 12.0M subs, 360k are lost to churn.
During Dec, with 12.2M subs (on Dec 1), 366k are lost to churn.
Leaving 12.4M subs on Dec 31 (or Jan 1 keeping the pattern).

So, throughout the year, 3.996M subs were lost to churn. This results
in an annual churn rate of 3.996M/12.4M = 32.2%. Probably even more
correct would be to say that the average number of subs for the year was
11.2M, which would yield a 3.996M/11.2M = 35.7% churn rate. Had there
been zero net annual sub growth instead of 24%, this 32.2%/35.7% would
be 36% (you can do that math). In other words, a "3% churn rate" DOES
mean a carrier is losing nearly 1/3 of their subscriber base every year,
and must make up for it with significant gross customer additions!

Can we be done with this now?

Whew.

Thank you redred, but the Sprint apologists will continue to lie about Churn
rates, which when combined with loss of market share is why Sprint stock went
down more than 20% last month, and why many Wall Street Analysts think
SprintPCS is now in play to be bought.