I'm less of a fan of J.D. Powers than I am of Consumer Reports, just stating that up front.

Beyond that, I know from personal experience working for Duracell, and making batteries for other companies, the label on the product being the only difference, it does make you wonder why these consumer groups can rate seemingly identical products so differently.

One thing, however, is the fact that products and services that are being made or provided for another company will often undergo stricter quality control measures and monitoring since it is being purchased in bulk quantities by those entities. Not just Duracell's reputation is on the line then, but the company for whom we are putting their name on the battery.

In other words, when one company makes a product, or provides a service for another, and markets that commodity under their name, more than just the reputation of one company is at stake. If something goes wrong, then it becomes a much bigger mess than if it were in-house problem with a customer, which is bad enough.

When I worked for White Consolidated Industries, we won the rights to produce some microwave ovens for Sharp. Sharp had MUCH stricter quality control guidelines than we were accustomed to, and we had to follow those guidelines when manufacturing their product, or lose the contract.

I imagine the same is probably true with Sprint. While they should definitely be on the ball with their own customers, apparently, they are quite capable of selling a top-notch product to a competitor.