Sprint to Waive Late Fees, Overage Charges and Roaming Fees for Joplin, Mo. Residents Affected by Recent Tornado

Sprint continues to support the City of Joplin Police, the Missouri Disaster Medical Assistance Team and other emergency agencies with wireless coverage and devices

OVERLAND PARK, Kan.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–To further aid the residents of Joplin, Mo. in the aftermath of last weekend’s devastating tornado, Sprint (NYSE: S) is proactively waiving late fees; overage charges for voice, text and data; and roaming fees for Sprint services between May 22 and June 22, 2011. This waiver applies to affected Sprint residents in the following ZIP codes: 64801, 64802, 64803 and 64804.

Sprint’s other relief initiatives include:

•A $100,000 donation the Sprint Foundation made to the American Red Cross in support of Joplin tornado relief, including matching donations made by Sprint employees and retirees and members of the Sprint board of directors.
•Deploying a Sprint Mobile Services Van to Joplin to provide local residents with wireless devices to make free phone calls, with charging stations for their mobile devices and with free wall and car chargers.
•Assembled and donated 10,000 sack lunches to Joplin families impacted by the tornadoes. The sack lunches were packed in one day by 700 Sprint employees for a food drive benefitting Harvesters.
•Waiving standard text-messaging fees for mobile donations, between now and June 30, 2011, for the following campaigns:

◦Text “REDCROSS” to “90999” to give $10 to American Red Cross Disaster Relief
â—¦Text “JOPLIN” to “80888” to make a $10 donation to the Salvation Army
◦Text “CONVOY” to “50555” to give $10 to Convoy of Hope
◦Text “JOPLIN” to “864833” to give $10 to the United Way-Heart of Missouri

In partnership with KB Mobile in Springfield, payLo by Virgin Mobile is providing 50 Joplin residents with free mobile phones and two months of free service. The recipients can use these devices for 1,500 anytime domestic minutes, 500 messages (text, picture messages, email and/or IM) and 10MB of Web access per month. Sprint’s prepaid brands, Boost Mobile, Virgin Mobile are also notifying all locally based customers regarding credits and other support being provided.
Sprint’s dedicated support to first responders and emergency medical workers in Joplin

Sprint’s network technicians and engineers have restored service to 90 percent of the cell sites within Missouri’s Jasper and Newton Counties and routed network capacity to operational cell sites. To further aid impacts to its network assets caused by the tornadoes, Sprint has deployed a Cell Site on Wheels (COW) to provide wireless coverage.

Since May 23, the Sprint Emergency Response Team (ERT) has been providing critical communications resources and personnel to aid local first responders, public safety officials and emergency medical workers managing the recovery in Joplin, including the City of Joplin Emergency Operations Center, the City of Joplin Police, the Missouri State Highway Patrol, the St John’s Hospital System, and the Missouri Disaster Medical Assistance Team.

For these agencies and others, Sprint ERT has deployed more than 150 mobile handsets to assist the recovery efforts, along with two Satellite Cell on Light Trucks (SatCOLTs) currently on air to provide wireless voice coverage and mobile IP data services.

Sprint ERT maintains a 24-hour hotline, 365 days a year, to rapidly address client needs. As it does following any state and federally declared national disasters, Sprint ERT is currently offering 25 mobile devices and wireless service free of charge for 14 days to state and local agencies helping with the recovery efforts.

Public safety officials seeking information about services from the Sprint Emergency Response Team should call 1-888-639-0020 or email ERTRequests@sprint.com.

About Sprint Nextel

Sprint Nextel offers a comprehensive range of wireless and wireline communications services bringing the freedom of mobility to consumers, businesses and government users. Sprint Nextel served more than 51 million customers at the end of 1Q 2011 and is widely recognized for developing, engineering and deploying innovative technologies, including the first wireless 4G service from a national carrier in the United States; offering industry-leading mobile data services, leading prepaid brands including Virgin Mobile USA, Boost Mobile, and Assurance Wireless; instant national and international push-to-talk capabilities; and a global Tier 1 Internet backbone. Newsweek ranked Sprint No. 6 in its 2010 Green Rankings, listing it as one of the nation’s greenest companies, the highest of any telecommunications company. You can learn more and visit Sprint at www.sprint.com or www.facebook.com/sprint and www.twitter.com/sprint.

Contacts
Sprint
Crystal Davis, 571-288-6806
crystal.davis@sprint.com
or
Melinda Tiemeyer, 913-315-3607
melinda.g.tiemeyer@sprint.com

Source: Business Wire