Why pay FULL price ??

[Wilbur]

Is there a financial advantage in paying full price?

Is this the nuts and bolts of it? Ball park figures: a Verizon S4 16Gb costs $650 retail. On a 2 year contract its $200. To break even you need $450 of monthly fee reductions ($18.75/month) over two years to break even, no?

I realize buying the phone lets you sell it before the two years of a normal contract and get that S5 "Next Big Thing."

 

[friedtators]

i think your pencil is not very sharp. my math is $450 or $18.75 per month for 24months. not being under the mans thumb is the real deal. they misbehave and you can say bye.

you just fixed it

 

[snookasnoo]

If you have unlimited its worth it to keep unlimited, at least for me.

 

[phantomog]

not being under the mans thumb is the real deal. they misbehave and you can say bye.

Is the ETF less than $450? If so, what are you saving? Also doesn't the ETF decrease over time?

Keeping unlimited or keeping some special plan/discount on your account is definitely an advantage, but I just don't see the cost savings simply not to have a contract (versus simply paying an ETF).

Luckily for me I have a dumbphone line which really is used as a dumbphone -- so I get my cake and eat it too.

 

[Wilbur]

i think your pencil is not very sharp. my math is $450 or $18.75 per month for 24months. not being under the mans thumb is the real deal. they misbehave and you can say bye.

you just fixed it

'

Yeah, I mess up first then edited it ... haha

 

[The Hustleman]

Is there a financial advantage in paying full price?

Is this the nuts and bolts of it? Ball park figures: a Verizon S4 16Gb costs $650 retail. On a 2 year contract its $200. To break even you need $450 of monthly fee reductions ($18.75/month) over two years to break even, no?

I realize buying the phone lets you sell it before the two years of a normal contract and get that S5 "Next Big Thing."

Keeping unlimited.


If you're a power user using a ton of data (I've only seen 5 people that are justified in keeping unlimited) I always advise them to pay retail.

I had one customer who used 200GB per month on average. He wanted to upgrade and I told him the policy and recommended he go to eBay or buy one outright from a store because he would occur some serious overages. I showed him everything and he merely thanked me and bought an S4 at retail.



Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

[zog1977]

Unlimited for sure. Me and my wife use over ten gigs a month. Switching to a shared plan raises my monthly 25 bucks, without taxes.

Buying retail was the best choice for me.

Plus best buy has 18 months interest free, so it's like paying cash

 

[loonie01]

I have 4 lines, 2 lines are out of contract. All lines have 4g unlimited data on them. I use roughly 50+ gigs a month myself. I pay just a little over $200 a month with $20 off each data plan (cought a special promotion). Now if I renew my contract to get a new phone, I'll be spending over $400 a month in data alone. Now pay a one time fee of $650 or monthly installments of about $57 through 12 months just to keep my unlimited. I chose to pay outright to save roughly $4800 a year

 

[nj1266]

I bought my 32 gig phone at retail and it was 103$ cheaper that way than to sign a 24 month contract. I also get to keep unlimited data. The share everything plan would have cost me more per month than my current plan and it did not have unlimited. The share everything has unlimited talk but I do not talk on the phone too much anyway. It has tethering but I am jailbroken and I have that.

Keeping my plan month to month and paying full price was just a better deal than signing a 2 year contract.


Sent from my iPhone 7

 

[Aquila]

Keeping unlimited.


If you're a power user using a ton of data (I've only seen 5 people that are justified in keeping unlimited) I always advise them to pay retail.

I had one customer who used 200GB per month on average. He wanted to upgrade and I told him the policy and recommended he go to eBay or buy one outright from a store because he would occur some serious overages. I showed him everything and he merely thanked me and bought an S4 at retail.



Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

Do you never help people upgrade subsidized while keeping unlimited?

 

[Aquila]

I mean if we're talking just straight math, even if you don't use the trick to keep your unlimited and buy on subsidy, why wouldn't you just add a line to the nationwide share plan or whatever it's called for $9.99 + approximately 8% in taxes, whatever... buy it on contract, $10.79*24 months =$258.96+$200 = $458.96 total price, cheaper than the outright or the EFT+subsidy and you have a spare line available for whatever in the future, like another off-cycle upgrade. You can put a dumb phone on it and have it as an emergency in the glove box phone, whatever.

Buying it outright is the 2nd most expensive way you can do it, if all you're trying to do is keep unlimited. The most expensive is buying it outright on their finance plan with the $2 charge 12 times adding $24 to the full price amount. 3rd is obviously paying subsidy and the full EFT while losing unlimited data and paying more per month (though of course, the EFT would go down by approximately $120 if you waited a year to upgrade and for some reason cancelled... not sure why this would be the plan), 4th is adding a line, but the cheapest, if it's an option is using the unlimited data retention method and upgrading, etc.

 

[The Hustleman]

Do you never help people upgrade subsidized while keeping unlimited?

I would if I could but the system won't even allow it.

If I don't touch the data plan and simply process the order it will automatically select the 2GB plan.


Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

[Wilbur]

I mean if we're talking just straight math, even if you don't use the trick to keep your unlimited and buy on subsidy, why wouldn't you just add a line to the nationwide share plan or whatever it's called for $9.99 + approximately 8% in taxes, whatever... buy it on contract, $10.79*24 months =$258.96+$200 = $458.96 total price, cheaper than the outright or the EFT+subsidy and you have a spare line available for whatever in the future, like another off-cycle upgrade. You can put a dumb phone on it and have it as an emergency in the glove box phone, whatever.

Buying it outright is the 2nd most expensive way you can do it, if all you're trying to do is keep unlimited. The most expensive is buying it outright on their finance plan with the $2 charge 12 times adding $24 to the full price amount. 3rd is obviously paying subsidy and the full EFT while losing unlimited data and paying more per month (though of course, the EFT would go down by approximately $120 if you waited a year to upgrade and for some reason cancelled... not sure why this would be the plan), 4th is adding a line, but the cheapest, if it's an option is using the unlimited data retention method and upgrading, etc.

Excellent posting! I was wondering along these same lines. The only alternative option to consider is paying full price allows you to sell the phone within the normal 2-year contract to get a newer S5 Next Best Thing. But I like the idea of having a second phone. I have a Motorola Razer flip phone that would work just fine for that situation.

 

[japetty]

Excellent posting! I was wondering along these same lines. The only alternative option to consider is paying full price allows you to sell the phone within the normal 2-year contract to get a newer S5 Next Best Thing. But I like the idea of having a second phone. I have a Motorola Razer flip phone that would work just fine for that situation.

I pay retail or buy a phone at swappa.com and stay off contract to keep my unlimited for now. I don't know how much longer unlimited will be around. I don't think it will go much past the end of the year after VZW puts the Voice on VoLTE and do with the text what ever and only have 4G/LTE. I read where they were going to keep the old stuff CDMA and the 3G data to farm out to other carriers.

 

[ibcop]

I mean if we're talking just straight math, even if you don't use the trick to keep your unlimited and buy on subsidy, why wouldn't you just add a line to the nationwide share plan or whatever it's called for $9.99 + approximately 8% in taxes, whatever... buy it on contract, $10.79*24 months =$258.96+$200 = $458.96 total price, cheaper than the outright or the EFT+subsidy and you have a spare line available for whatever in the future, like another off-cycle upgrade. You can put a dumb phone on it and have it as an emergency in the glove box phone, whatever.

Buying it outright is the 2nd most expensive way you can do it, if all you're trying to do is keep unlimited. The most expensive is buying it outright on their finance plan with the $2 charge 12 times adding $24 to the full price amount. 3rd is obviously paying subsidy and the full EFT while losing unlimited data and paying more per month (though of course, the EFT would go down by approximately $120 if you waited a year to upgrade and for some reason cancelled... not sure why this would be the plan), 4th is adding a line, but the cheapest, if it's an option is using the unlimited data retention method and upgrading, etc.

That $9.99 line is more like $16 or $17 each month after all the taxes and regulatory fees are added.

 

[F34R]

That $9.99 line is more like $16 or $17 each month after all the taxes and regulatory fees are added.

Yeah, mines $15.01 per month for that line.

 

[Aquila]

Ok I just used 8% tax/fees because that's approximately the % of my total bill that is not services. Seems like it's closer to 50.10% taxes on that extra line.

 

[Zman1001]

Yeah, mines $15.01 per month for that line.

The extra line on my bill comes in at $12.67. That is for a line with a dumb phone and nothing else.

 

[paintdrinkingpete]

There are two primary reasons:

1. Keep unlimited data

2. To *not* have to renew your contract

As has been pointed out, yes, it can actually be cheaper to just pay the ETF if you wanted out of the contract, and the unlimited data thing won't save you a ton of money unless you actually use it. When you add onto that the fact that VZW doesn't discount your monthly rate if you are not paying off a subsidized phone, there really aren't that many times when it can *save* you money.

I bought my GS3 outright, but decided to bite the bullet and get my S4 at the subsidized price and renew my contract (mainly because my data usage wasn't high enough to justify paying full price just to hold onto unlimited data). What was nice, however, is that I can still sell the S3 and recoup some of that money, and because I didn't burn my upgrade when I bought it, I was able to save my upgrade and use it for the S4.

 

[dpham00]

The extra line on my bill comes in at $12.67. That is for a line with a dumb phone and nothing else.

The fees and taxes vary depending on your area. I am paying about $4 a month in taxes and fees. Yours is probably one of the lowest I have heard of, and $7 is on the high end. I have attached a screen shot of mine

Sent from my Verizon Samsung Galaxy Note II