In less than a year's time, ROK Mobile has under gone numerous iterations. We've seen the company discontinue its Sprint based plans only to bring them back at a later date. A Verizon based unlimited plan was discontinued only to return later at a higher rate. We've seen other Verizon and AT&T based plans come and go as well. What was once ROK Mobile's core feature, ROK Music is no more. You can see a history of all the changes I've cataloged in the ROK Mobile news feed.
ROK Mobile Is Now Exclusively An AT&T Based Provider
ROK Mobile's latest change is to drop its Verizon and Sprint based plans. According to Prepaid Phone News, ROK Mobile dealers were notified that activations are now only available online and on AT&T's network. All new customer activations via indirect retail channels have also been discontinued.
With the changes, ROK Mobile is now only offering two phone plans, and they are not competitively priced. The plans are set as follows:
Both plans include unlimited talk, text and data with the specified amount of data at high speeds.
- $40/month - 4GB of high speed data
- $60/month - 8GB of high speed data
Once the plans high speed data allotment gets used up, speeds are reduced to presumably 64kbps - 128kbps. Hotspot is not advertised as being included or allowed, and taxes and fees cost extra.
ROK Mobile's Plans Are Expensive, Do They Include Other Features?
When you look at this AT&T MVNO comparison list, you can see that ROK Mobile's plans don't hold up well to the competition.
This is in part because ROK Mobile offers some features that no other provider has. The features include:
- Family Telemedicine - gives subscribers access to a board certified doctor 24/7/365
- Pharmacy Savings - customers can save up to 75% on prescription medicines
In addition to the ROK Mobile exclusive features, the company also offers a couple of features more commonly found elsewhere and they include:
- ROK Rewards program - subscribers get discounts at over 500,000 restaurants and retailers
- Free international calls - subscribers get a $5 international call credit to use every month.
What To Do If You Are A ROK Mobile Verizon Or Sprint Based Customer
If you are on a discontinued ROK Mobile plan, you will be grandfathered into the system and allowed to keep it. Dealers will still be offering top-ups for those plans as well.
Editor's Take
Sometimes when an MVNO makes a lot of changes in the short term it can mean the company is doing well. Other times it can be a sign of big trouble. With all the recent chaos and inconsistencies at ROK Mobile, I'm afraid this may be a case of the latter. The changes suggest to me that ROK Mobile is having trouble finding its niche and attracting customers. The reasons for this may be plentiful.
For one thing, the plans are expensive. Do people really want a telemedicine and pharmacy savings plan with their phone plan to justify its higher cost? History would suggest no. ROK Mobile was previously offering similar odd bonus features including burial and cremation service and accidental death insurance with its plans as well. Those features now seem to be discontinued.
If ROK Mobile is going to try and bundle extra service features with its plans perhaps it should do so at lower price points. The company may be better served to offer low cost phone plans to those in need while keeping those bonus features in tact. Or perhaps it would be a better idea if the company could bundle its service with items that would be more appealing to the masses. How about sign up with Geico or Allstate insurance and get a free or discounted phone plan from ROK Mobile?
I suppose the plan discontinuations could once again be temporary. Only time will tell. In the meantime, the repeated changes that are occurring at ROK Mobile give us a lot to digest. ROK Mobile wants you to know, that no matter what is happening, your number is safe with them. In fact their website reads:
"ROK Mobile has two incredible founders, Jonathan Kendrick a seasoned British entrepreneur and billionaire John Paul DeJoria, co-founder of Paul Mitchell and Patrón Spirits. With founders like these you can be rest assured that ROK Mobile isn’t going anywhere and is here to stay."
What do you think? Is ROK Mobile here to stay?
I had signed because of the ROK Music it once offered and I had been paying for Spotify.
Loved ROK Music and then it was ‘gone’, no more music app.
And now I have no phone and my credit card was just charged $52.39!
I’ve been following Rok since they had a dealer program and have been criticized and lauded their ups and downs . I’ve also been in touch with insiders at Rok who said they were taking dealer suggestions into considerations and were undergoing new management a while back. All I can say is that with the zero day notice they gave in eliminating the entire dealer program, the collapse of cdma and their loss of their once powerful Verizon cdma $50 unlimited plan they are a damaged ship with no rudder, probably no leadership and the compartments are flooding rapidly with no more room to counterflood and correct a sinking ship. I honestly think with this they have sealed their own fate. With no dealer program bringing in new activations and not even public prepaid refill websites like callingmart selling Rok I don’t see how they are going to survive. I believe honestly they will be dead within six months to a year. Possibly again with no notice. The bottomline is as a dealer I washed my hands of them as soon as the Verizon $50 plan was gone.