Verizon's new plans

[dpham00]

I was in a VZ Corporate store today, and was told that after the 29th, any family plan that includes a smartphone will automatically be forced to the Share Everything Plan if any lines are upgraded. I specifically asked about a tiered individual plan, and she told me that was not a possibility, and that our options were to upgrade any lines before the 29th to keep our current plan, or NEVER upgrade, and buy phones off contract. After that, all bets were off. She even said that to use a tiered plan, you had to pay FULL RETAIL for a phone (I'm not sure I buy that one.) I was also told that at some point, regardless of plan or upgrade, unlimited data was going away.

You were told wrong, Verizon's website explicitly said that you can keep tiered data. Far from the first time that a Verizon rep has informed someone incorrectly and also far from the last time as well.

You're not required to move to Share Everything but if you do, unlimited data will not be retained on your line. As a Verizon Wireless customer you have choices when you upgrade at discounted pricing. You can choose from a standalone data package starting at $30 for 2GB or a Share Everything Plan. If keeping unlimited is important to you, you can choose to upgrade and pay full retail price for the phone.

Share Everything Plan: Unlimited Talk & Text with Shared Data.

 

[Joelist]

The thing is that while the CONCEPT behind the share everything plans is a good one there are a couple of places where the execution is lacking, making the plan uneconomical unless you have a pretty weird usage scenario.

Place one is charging 30 per month for voice and text on dumb phones. The 40 per month for smartphones is actually pretty economical - remember you get all your voice and text for that 40. They should have made it 25 for dumb phones.

Place two is the data pricing; it starts way too expensive and doesn't scale well. Basically their $50 for 1GB needs a family with more than two smartphones and that uses 1GB or less combined to be economical. And the pricing stays stupid as you scale up - you have to get a 6GB pool to get the per GB price to be in line with the $30/2GB of the individual plans.

To be honest, instead of the tiered buckets like they did I think I would have had it be "build your own bucket" at a price structure of $12 per GB for the first 5 and $10 per GB thereafter (or something like that). This would let people customize their shared bucket properly and also would avoid the big pricing problems at the lower ends of the data usage spectrum.

 

[droidlove11]

So for those of you who want to keep unlimited and also get a subsidized phone, how does this sound.

1. Add a line right now to your family share plan with basic phone
2. You can save that for a rainy day and do an upgrade to say a Razr HD or whatever comes out
3. You can ESN change back to your original customer owned equipment (basic phone) on the spare line
4. Technically the policy is buying at full retail or providing your own phone to activate on your functional line will keep the unlimited.
5. You bought a Razr HD for the subsidy and still got to keep unlimted. (work the system)
6. Only cost is an extra 10 bucks but I recommend adding the extra line now because if you wait until after the 28th, I dont believe you can add lines to existing family share plans that exist today. Adding lines will also force you into one of the new plans.

SN: I recognize that the plans for some seem high, others it seems to be almost the same as they have, and for a few it may be cheaper. We just have to come to terms with one thing. You have fullfilled your contract with VZW on an unlimited plan. Verizon reserves the right to set the price and conditions of giving you another subsidy for a two year renewal. If they dont want to extend your unlimited plan and give you a subsidy, that's within their rights. We just need to deal with it because everyone looking to complain, boycott, jump ship, lobby congress, etc, it wont make a bit of difference.

 

[fyrfytr24]

What truly frusturates me with everything is that smarphones are moving so much towards working on "virtual" storage. Google Music, dropbox, cloud storage...all of this are promoted by big red but now they want to charge us for that.

 

[lou61166]

This certainly does not favor those who have multiple devices,I have just my rezound and Verizon FiOS at my house,I rarely hit 2GB in a month with a 4 GB Cap

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using Tapatalk 2

 

[kulkaholic]

Subtly sharing clothing details I see? Well, two can plaid that game.

Lol thanks for the humor.

Sent from my ADR6425LVW using Android Central Forums

 

[humpagardengnome]

Go figure, on a day I thought would be an unhappy one for shareholders. I guess Verizon stock hit a 4 year high yesterday, so I suppose if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Buy some shares, hopefully dividends will assist in helping to pay your exorbitant monthly billing down the line.

 

[skatergirl]

So for those of you who want to keep unlimited and also get a subsidized phone, how does this sound.

1. Add a line right now to your family share plan with basic phone
2. You can save that for a rainy day and do an upgrade to say a Razr HD or whatever comes out
3. You can ESN change back to your original customer owned equipment (basic phone) on the spare line
4. Technically the policy is buying at full retail or providing your own phone to activate on your functional line will keep the unlimited.
5. You bought a Razr HD for the subsidy and still got to keep unlimted. (work the system)
6. Only cost is an extra 10 bucks but I recommend adding the extra line now because if you wait until after the 28th, I dont believe you can add lines to existing family share plans that exist today. Adding lines will also force you into one of the new plans.

SN: I recognize that the plans for some seem high, others it seems to be almost the same as they have, and for a few it may be cheaper. We just have to come to terms with one thing. You have fullfilled your contract with VZW on an unlimited plan. Verizon reserves the right to set the price and conditions of giving you another subsidy for a two year renewal. If they dont want to extend your unlimited plan and give you a subsidy, that's within their rights. We just need to deal with it because everyone looking to complain, boycott, jump ship, lobby congress, etc, it wont make a bit of difference.

It sounds like in your plan that you would be buying another smartphone after the 28th? From what I understand, as soon as you buy a subsidized phone after the 28th, you are forced to move off your current plan even if it is a family plan. I hope I am correct in how I saw your plan?

 

[MrSmith317]

It sounds like in your plan that you would be buying another smartphone after the 28th? From what I understand, as soon as you buy a subsidized phone after the 28th, you are forced to move off your current plan even if it is a family plan. I hope I am correct in how I saw your plan?

I think the trick is to use an extra line to upgrade. So you have 2 lines. 1 that you use and one that you don't. While it does add to savings over the "share everything" plan, it's still more expensive than it needs to be.

I'm telling you all now. If you can, when your contract is up leave Verizon. Vote with your wallet. I understand that many can't for numerous reasons but this fight is one that we need to win.

 

[DRKayak]

Go figure, on a day I thought would be an unhappy one for shareholders. I guess Verizon stock hit a 4 year high yesterday, so I suppose if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Buy some shares, hopefully dividends will assist in helping to pay your exorbitant monthly billing down the line.

That is how the world spins. Verizon is owned by its stock holders. Verizon's purpose for existence is to make money for the stock holders. It happens do that by providing communications services, ergo, make money off of communications, make more money off of communications, next quarter, make more money.

We consumers of communications can only have a say by changing providers, but Verizon is the best where I live, so I take it, I take it, I take it until somebody offers a better service and deal. That limit will be reached someday. :-$

 

[Dovahkiin]

I think the trick is to use an extra line to upgrade. So you have 2 lines. 1 that you use and one that you don't. While it does add to savings over the "share everything" plan, it's still more expensive than it needs to be.

That idea is so ridiculous. So $10 to add a line, and the cheapest data package at $30. Total of $40. In one year, that's $480 before taxes.
Might as well buy a phone for full retail.

 

[tmettler5]

Go figure, on a day I thought would be an unhappy one for shareholders. I guess Verizon stock hit a 4 year high yesterday, so I suppose if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Buy some shares, hopefully dividends will assist in helping to pay your exorbitant monthly billing down the line.

Yeah...the funny thing is...I'm pissed about this plan change as a Verizon customer. But I own stock...so I am kind of pleased with that, I guess...

 

[majorpayne]

Wow just wow....

I try doing something nice for the in law's and verizon is now going to shaft me for it.

I added my in-laws to my account to save then a few bucks... to me it was 30 bucks (3 dumb phones) plus taxes and all that. To them it was saving them about 90ish and I haven't asked them to help pay... now what does Big Red do? They jack up the price of the dumbphones. OMG... I looked at my bill last month.. combined we used 490 out of 1400 and 1238 text out of unlimited

guess what that means.. unlimited talk doesn't do me jack! it's going to add about 60 a month more to my plan. but I'm stuck due to the region my in law's live in as nothing else works we out where they are.

 

[dpham00]

That idea is so ridiculous. So $10 to add a line, and the cheapest data package at $30. Total of $40. In one year, that's $480 before taxes.
Might as well buy a phone for full retail.

You can put a dumb phone on the line to avoid the data charge. If you are using the line solely to upgrade and don't plan on using it at all, Verizon can set up a dummy phone on that line, so no physical phone, but you would still have to pay $ 10 a month plus applicable tax and fees which for me is around $4-5.

 

[dpham00]

You can buy a basic cpo phone without subsidy. I called them a few weeks ago and they have some for around $100.it would have a one year warranty just like new.

Wow just wow....

I try doing something nice for the in law's and verizon is now going to shaft me for it.

I added my in-laws to my account to save then a few bucks... to me it was 30 bucks (3 dumb phones) plus taxes and all that. To them it was saving them about 90ish and I haven't asked them to help pay... now what does Big Red do? They jack up the price of the dumbphones. OMG... I looked at my bill last month.. combined we used 490 out of 1400 and 1238 text out of unlimited

guess what that means.. unlimited talk doesn't do me jack! it's going to add about 60 a month more to my plan. but I'm stuck due to the region my in law's live in as nothing else works we out where they are.

 

[majorpayne]

You can buy a basic cpo phone without subsidy. I called them a few weeks ago and they have some for around $100.it would have a one year warranty just like new.

ignore this i googled cpo.. not sure if that would fly (with the in-laws) but you never know...

 

[majorpayne]

and I bet the discount is only going to be applied to the base account.

which i put in my normal usage and it's $110 for 4 gb and unlmited text and talk.. 110 for 1 line that means the other 130 is for 4 phones...bah Might be time to get a landline again!

 

[Dovahkiin]

You can put a dumb phone on the line to avoid the data charge. If you are using the line solely to upgrade and don't plan on using it at all, Verizon can set up a dummy phone on that line, so no physical phone, but you would still have to pay $ 10 a month plus applicable tax and fees which for me is around $4-5.

I see what you're saying. I'm kinda doing this inadvertently, but someone is actually using the dumbphone, and I originally added the line for actual use.
In this case though, it would be a $120 yearly gift for Verizon, which is still $120 too much. Now that a dumbphone will cost $30 per line instead of $10, I'm sure this practice will come to an end (except for unlimited data clingers, obviously)
I had a moment of fail in the previous post. Dumbphones skipped my mind.

 

[dpham00]

ignore this i googled cpo.. not sure if that would fly (with the in-laws) but you never know...

Cpo looks brand new. That is your cheapest option to carry full warranty. Of course, there is ebay and cl, but no warranty for used devices. Depending on the phone cost, you can add a line, end it and pay $175 etf and get out slightly ahead of paying full retail if the phone was a free phone. Make sure to cancel the line within 3 days of activation to avoid the $30 activation fee. Probably best to cancel on the same day since charges are prorated. I am not 100% sure if verizon would do exchanges but the phone manufacturer would have to warranty it for the original owner.

 

[dpham00]

I see what you're saying. I'm kinda doing this inadvertently, but someone is actually using the dumbphone, and I originally added the line for actual use.
In this case though, it would be a $120 yearly gift for Verizon, which is still $120 too much. Now that a dumbphone will cost $30 per line instead of $10, I'm sure this practice will come to an end (except for unlimited data clingers, obviously)
I had a moment of fail in the previous post. Dumbphones skipped my mind.

Your other option if you wanted a new smartphones but did not want to pay full retail would be to open a new line, cancel on the same day, and pay $350 etf. Note that some 3rd party have additional etf. When the rezound was $50 back in November, you could have gotten it for $400 with etf and essentially, no contract. You could not have taken it for a penny from amazon since they have an additional etf.