T-Mobile has announced it will delay the planned shutdown of Sprint’s CDMA network by three months.

T-Mobile purchased Sprint in April 2020, and quickly began integrating the carrier’s spectrum into its own network. T-Mobile had originally planned on shutting down Sprint’s CDMA network effective January 1, 2022, but the company now says it will delay the shutdown till March 31, 2022.

“To build out our revolutionary network that will deliver the broadest and deepest 5G experience FOR ALL across the country, we need to sunset outdated CDMA technologies as soon as possible so every consumer, no matter their circumstances, will have access to the best connectivity and best experience,” the company writes in a blog post. “This is why we have aggressively executed on plans to take care of transitioning our impacted Sprint CDMA customers by the end of this year and provided our partners plenty of time and resources to take care of their customers as well.

“Recently it’s become increasingly clear that some of those partners haven’t followed through on their responsibility to help their customers through this shift. So, we’re stepping up on their behalf. We have made the decision to extend our deadline for the CDMA sunset by three months to March 31, 2022.”

The company says the delay will have no impact on its 5G rollout and, at the same time, called out its partners for dragging their feet.

“There should be no more room for excuses. We have provided even more time and those partners can follow suit with the effort that is needed to ensure no one is left on the wrong side of the digital divide.”