Cell service and quality diminished in rural area after getting iphone 12 with 5g

[JDTCOLTON]

My family became a customer of Verizon over 6 years ago. We all got iphone 6's at the time. We chose Verizon for one reason 6 years ago. They had coverage up north at our cabin. While the customer service has not always been the best, we have chosen to stay a customer due to the fact it had the best service up north at the cabin, where my boys hunt, my husband hunts. It's peace of mind knowing in the woods they have access to call for help when or if needed. At our cabin location, we have always been able to call, text, receive calls/texts, access the weather app, email, google maps. This year, I was upgraded my iphone 6 to a iphone 12, which has 5G. I assumed nothing for service at our cabin would change. The deal was so good, my husband and one of my kids also upgraded to iphone 12. We went up north 7/4 with new phones to see No Service on our phones!!! Verizon informed we needed to change our settings in the cellular section to Standard and LTE and that would resolve it. They said rural areas don't have 5G, but this would resolve the issue. We just went up north over labor day, while our phones show LTE extended network with one or two blips of service that bounces to No Service often, the service was terrible! Calls failed with two blips of service; texts only were able to come in or out when we found a small spot on the property that was two blips of service. We had a vehicle emergency at the cabin and had to walk a mile to get clear voice service. We tried, once we found two blips of service at the cabin but our call first failed. Then tried again and it was so broken, the receiver could not understand what we were saying. I am beside myself. We will not feel comfortable with the boys hunting with no quality cell service. This is a safety issue. Verizon will lose four of us if this situation cannot be resolved. Why would getting a new phone change the quality of our cell service? Others up north have Verizon, but have older phones and still have the coverage we once had. Please advise how this can be resolved. If it cannot, we will leave as customers.

[Russe77]

Service has gone down hill dramatically in my area as well.