The nation's third largest wireless provider has come in dead last in Consumer Reports' latest cell phone service survey. According to the report, the company turned in "dismal marks" in 4G reliability, text messaging, value and voice service. A year ago, Sprint finished in second place behind Verizon Wireless.
Sprint is in the middle of a massive overhaul of their network which will ultimately provider better and faster service but in the interim, things are pretty rough. As a result, a number of customers have ditched the carrier over the past couple of years.
A representative for Sprint told CNET that while the Consumer Reports survey is disappointing, it isn't necessarily surprising. During the past year, Sprint has asked customers to "pardon their dust" so to speak as they build out and upgrade their network.
Part of that new effort is an enhanced LTE network dubbed Sprint Spark. It's already available in select areas and according to the company, customer satisfaction has improved accordingly among those with access to it.
Elsewhere, Verizon once again topped the charts as the highest-rated carrier while rivals AT&T and T-Mobile received "ho-hum" results. One thing to note, however, is that AT&T was the only carrier of the bunch to earn the top rating for 4G reliability.
The report also found that many consumers are paying for more data than they actually use. A full 38 percent of those surveyed used half or less than half of their monthly allotment of data. This of course isn't applicable to Sprint and T-Mobile as they continue to offer unlimited data plans.