Network operator T-Mobile has announced a new 'Simply Pre-Paid' plan, putting the company in direct competition with its subsidiary MetroPCS, Sprint, Republic Wireless and Ting.

The pre-paid plans will start at $40 per month, offering unlimited 2G data, talk, text and 1GB of 4G LTE data. For $50, users can get 3GB of 4G data, for $60 it is increased to 5GB of 4G data. T-Mobile does not add this caveat on its promotions, and it is a major part of the pre-paid deal, since 2G connections tend to drop into Kbps speed, compared to 4G LTE's apparent 100Mbps speed.

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MetroPCS, T-Mobile's subsidiary, is already one of the largest pre-paid providers. Alongside T-Mobile's own pre-paid plans, it is the number one for pre-paid deals, surpassing Sprint in 2014. The new deals could cause some cannibalization of the market, but technically T-Mobile is not removing a customer if they move from MetroPCS to T-Mobile, so it makes little difference.

A T-Mobile spokesperson claimed Simply Pre-paid plans were "really just about creating choices for our different customers."

T-Mobile's other pre-paid plan is called Simple Choice, $10 extra for essentially the same $40 plan on Simply Pre-paid, however the Simple Choice plans offers an unlimited 4G LTE option for $80 per month.

Getting carrier plans convoluted is never a good thing, T-Mobile might want to scrap some of its deals that override other plans, unless it wants to confuse customers into buying a potentially more expensive contract with the same features.

TagsT-Mobile, Simply Pre-Paid, pre-paid plans, MetroPCS, U.S. carriers