T-Mobile is raising prices on its mobile plans yet again, even for plans advertised with a “price guarantee.” A higher fee will now apply to each line on certain plans.
T-Mobile has announced an increase for its “Regulatory Programs and Telecommunications Recovery Fee,” which was previously increased in April. For voice lines, the fee is now $4.49 per month per line, up from $3.99. For mobile internet lines, it’s jumping from $1.60 to $2.10. The change will go into effect starting January 21, 2026.
Those fees might not seem like much money, but they can add up over time, especially for larger families. A plan with four voice lines and one internet line would now cost $20.06 per month with just this one fee, excluding the base cost of the plan, device payments, and any other taxes and fees. That example would add up to $240.72 per year.
Despite the name including “regulatory,” the price for the Regulatory Programs and Telecommunications Recovery Fee is not set by the United States federal government or individual state legislatures. Those are usually a sales tax, and not a fixed per-line cost. The extra fee is just a convenient way to raise prices for customers without affecting the “price lock” or “price guarantee” of the base plan.
T-Mobile’s own support website says as much: “This fee is not a government tax or imposed by the government; rather, the fee is collected and retained by T-Mobile to help recover certain costs we have already incurred and continue to incur.”
Thankfully, some T-Mobile plans with taxes and fees included will not see a price increase this time around. That includes the older Magenta or T-Mobile One plans. Most recent plans from the company do not include taxes and fees, so T-Mobile can raise them whenever it wants.
Many customers are understandably upset at the news. In a Reddit thread about the price hike, one person said, “I just switched in October and I was fully aware they’d increase the fees eventually since that wasn’t part of the so-called price guarantee but I did not expect it to be this quick.”
This is nowhere near the first time T-Mobile and other mobile networks have increased prices for existing mobile plans, even with ones initially advertised with guarantees that the price would not change. A class action lawsuit against T-Mobile’s false advertising was filed in July 2024, but it has not yet been settled or reached the trial stage.
It’s worth noting here that T-Mobile’s corporate earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) was $8.7 billion from Q3 2024 to Q3 2025. That’s a whole lot of profit—described as “best in industry growth” by T-Mobile—accomplished in part by slowly increasing this fee and others like it.
Source: T-Mobile, The Mobile Report
