This environment of rising inflation has begun to extend to mobile phone bills. And one carrier is directly challenging its two rivals.

T-Mobile this week announced a “Carrier Callout” directed at its rivals AT&T and Verizon. The callout also reminded customers that T-Mobile earlier this month launched Price Lock. It’s directed at those two rival carriers, who have both raised prices of late—AT&T, with a recently raised rate, and Verizon, which recently instituted an “Economic Adjustment Charge.”

T-Mobile describes that offer as “a promise for ALL new postpaid and broadband customers on eligible rate plans that the price of your current talk, text, and data will stay the same unless YOU change it. This notches another industry first with the first-ever consumer price guarantee on an unlimited 5G plan – including Essentials, Magenta, Magenta MAX, postpaid segment plans (55+, military, first responder), and 5G Home Internet.”

The goal is to get customers of the other two carriers to switch over to T-Mobile.

“Inflation shouldn’t be an excuse to jack up prices just because you can get away with it. But that’s The Carriers’ way,” Mike Sievert, CEO of T-Mobile, said in the press release. “T-Mobile is here to help our customers battle inflation by not adding to the stress of price hikes. It’s got to be a mind-numbing experience for AT&T and Verizon customers who have watched their rates go up continuously over the last few years.”

The campaign includes a new thirty-second television commercial featuring actor Ben Barnes and filmed in the style of a commercial for a class-action lawyer.

The “callout” continued with a message for the rival carriers.

“So, we’re presenting The Carriers with a valiant challenge: Verizon and AT&T, do your customers a favor and adopt a version of T-Mobile's Price Lock,” the T-Mobile announcement said. “It’s as simple as it sounds. Just commit to not raising rate plan prices for existing customers while they remain on their current plan. But hey, if that’s not a promise you can make, we’ll make sure your customers know it. Oh, and we’ll have fun along the way at your expense, so consider this challenge carefully. Otherwise, it’s game on.”

However, shortly after the announcement of that offer, there were reports of a service outage for T-Mobile users on Tuesday. Downdetector collected reports of outages starting around noon on Tuesday and continuing throughout the afternoon. The outages were reported most often in the northeastern United States, including in New York, Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C.

Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.

Image: Reuters.