I would like to start off by saying that between my self and my father we have been with verizon since he bought an analog cell phone in 1998. But that should not matter because all customers should be treated the same. I will explain my recent issue below.
This past week a family member who was on my account decided to up and leave verizon and got his own account with T Mobile, who in my area has very good coverage. This is based on actual people who use T Mobile, not looking at a coverage map. He basically stuck me with his line and a $190 ETF. I fully understand that i am responsible for that fee and I'm not arguing that. However this all ties in together with my next part of the story.
Also, in the middle of all this we have been looking at ways to lower the bill. Currently the bill was around $200 sometimes less sometimes as high as $220. that was for 3 phones and only 2GB of data! only 1 line is under contract . the other 2 have been month to month for probably 2 years. I was unsuccessful at lowering the bill with out having to sacrifice, such as removing insurance, etc. So i explore other carriers. AT&T for 10GB of data, yes 10 GB of data, thats 5 times as much, comes out to 145 a month (100 for data 15 for each device. Compare that to verizon over 200 for only 2GB? thats incredible over $55 a month savings plus 5 times as much data usage. with my 22% off discount from the 100 data id save another $20 so now I'm at $125. with verizon i only get the discount from the data package as well. so $50 ends up being about $40 . not a real savings there .
current promo - will give me $100 for every line that i open or port over to ATT
Next stop is T Mobile, unlimited everything for 3 lines is $90 a month for 500 mb of LTE data per line. if i upgrade that to 2.5 GB per line of LTE data the price is $120 total. and theres no overages after 2.5 GB they only throttle the speed down. for $150 a month i can get unlimited LTE for all 3 lines. but for my case i would only need the 2.5 gb of LTE for 1 line. which puts me at $100 a month and never will have overages. and i can upgrade or downgrade the data on the other lines for only $10 more a month. not a bad deal. I'm between $90-150 depending on how much high speed i want, will never have overages and can change the plan at any time to get more high speed. this works great if I'm taking a trip and will use more data i know i won't have overages. my discount here would be 15% off the entire bill so 110 ends up being 93.50
current promo - will pay my ETF
so here are my options -
att is $125 a month for 10 GB which i will never never never go over.
t mobile $93.50 a month for unlimited everything and 2.5gb LTE and for only $10 more i can have unlimited LTE
verizon $200 for 2gb of LTE
not to mention prepaid carriers .. straight talk, net10 the list goes on.unlimited for $45. all of which have great service in the philly/southjersey area and use the main carriers service anyway.
before going any further i will say i have 3 unlocked phones that i can use so I'm not factoring in cost of the device. please do not try to justify using one carrier over the other because of the different ways they finance the device. the device costs are the same at all carriers so that wouldn't change. only thing that changes is how much to put down or pay per month. iphone is always 650, 750, 850 no matter what.
so now lets put these 2 problems together. I call customer care to see options for canceling the line that the family member stuck me with. Its $190 to cancel. i admit i am responsible for it and explain that i can not afford that fee and if i have to pay that then i will be switching to ATT or t mobile. both who will give me month for switching (tmobile pays the ETF and att will credit me $100 per line so $300 total)
the rep immediately says i can transfer the contract date to one of the lines with no contract. . I tell him that is a nice offer however those 2 lines have been out of contract for 2 years. and when i want to upgrade them i dont want to be stuck with the upgrade date. i also explained the only phone is used very little for work purposes and i will never upgrade or put a contract on that line. he understands and advises me that that is the only option to cancel a line with no ETF.i move on to my bill. i ask him what can be done about it. i asked about the loyalty plans. he advises me that for my main line i can have $60 loyalty plan which is 2gb data and unlimited talk/text with $15 overage per GB. however theres always a catch. i have to sign a 1 year agreement, i can not thether the data, i can NOT use my discount with a loyalty plan . for the other line i do not use much the only option is 30 minutes no text no data for $15 a month or $45 for unlimited talk/text and 500mb of data and $15 overage for every 250 MB which is crazy . I'm better off just taking 2 of the $60 options. but again i must sign a 1 year agreement, no thether, crazy overage fees and no discount. so now i end up having 2 lines that are out of contract put onto a contract. 1 of which i can not upgrade until the date of the contract that they switched over. so after 2 years of paying subsidized prices and not having a contract, the only way to get a better price plan is to sign a contact (which was never offered before when you sign a contract) then they dictate how i can use my data by saying i can't thether, plus have overages and no discount. 2gb is borderline. yes i can stay under if I'm constantly checking my data count and only use the phone when i need to. not for fun.
needless to say i told the rep i would on consider and call back. today i call back 2 times to get more information and see if theres a different type of loyalty plan. one time i get the run around. the next time I'm on "hold", but the theres no hold music, etc is just quiet..... so i hung up after 20 mins.
At this point the only way I'm considering staying with verizon is if i can get a good price plan.
hopefully a rep will see this and respond. my billing cycle ends the 6th and this is the last weekend i have to make the switch before I'm billed another $200 for 2gb of data.
