Usage data is complete nonsense

[J_Shook]

I check my usage data daily to make sure I do not exceed my data budget. Today I learned that yesterday I used -335.601 MB Yes, I somehow transferred negative data. This is the second time THIS WEEK that this has happened. Anomalies in the space-time continuum aside, I don't think this is possible. Hey, if I keep this up, Verizon will owe ME money.

I have spoken at length with techs at Verizon, and the basic message is that these numbers are NEVER RELIABLE. No kidding. You cannot budget your internet usage using this "data" as a guide. It's virtually fantasy. Also looking at session logs is useless (you are even warned by VZAccess Manager not to rely on them.)

I have installed a desktop utility ("SurplusMeter") that gives me figures that are highly plausible and virtually instantaneous. So it would not be impossible for Verizon to write a similar utility (or license SurplaceMeter) to provide accurate client-side usage data.

As it stands, there is no way for me to know if I am close to exceeding my budget except to STOP USING THE COMPUTER for a few days before the end of the billing period when I sense I am getting close to my limit. So I am paying for a service I cannot use.

I consider the illusion Verizon spins about your data usage to be deceptive and bordering on fraudulent, because it has the effect of encoiuraging users exceed their data budget without knowing it, no matter how hard they try to track this.

Also, a couple of days at the end of the last billing cycle, the usage data info "froze," even as I continued to use the computer for internet access. Would I be too cynical if I suspected that this data blackout was put in place to trick people to exceed their data budgets? I wonder...

In any event, I am completely flabbergasted that Verizon cannot provide timely and accurate data for its users. The techs I have spoken with over the phone admit that the system is severely inadequate. Isn't Verizon the company where hundreds of people follow you around to provide all the benefits of "the network"? Is it too much to ask that one of them carry a clipboard and keep accurate track of my data usage?

[Country]

Now I know where I got my extra 300 mb from that week.

My usage is not matching up to what i used according to there site log.

[Boyhowdy120]

You are correct in the fact that the usage window that the vzmanager provides is useless during the last week B4 your rollover-reset.

I too am very frustrated by the inaccuracy of this display, and do hope that Verizon will issue a "fix" for this, considering the bux they are pulling down for data transfer, they should make available the tools to manage our data transfer to us that they scrutinize their customers with.

[Country]

I can understand the usage window being behind or little off.

You can delete a few items or such.

They have a usage log on there site.

I used this to put in usage into a spreadsheet and the total was under what they say i use.

Seems alot of issues with verizon on this.

[Deamorei]

Register a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. Every time a complaint is filed they actually pursue it. Also while your at their website you can see the thousands and thousands of complaints made against VZW. Also so write your congressmen and senators and let them know about your troubles. We the end user don't have much influence on getting VZW to change their ways regretfully. It's not like your electric bill at home where you can walk outside and take second by second readings at your meter. If a wireless broadband customer gets overcharged, who is to say it wasn't a mistake on the supplier end a place where we don't have access to? Imagine if your bank just updated data whenever it wanted to lol..