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International Data Plan

Is anyone else particularly annoyed by the change to the International Data Plans?

Verizon used to have a domestic data plan and an international one, both with unlimited data. They offered the option of switching from one to the other at will without commitment or service charge. This was great. I would travel overseas for a week having switched to the international plan, then switch back when I got home. Verizon representatives encouraged me to do the switching on & off as necessary. I think the price difference was an additional $35/month, prorated. I travel about every 6 weeks, for about a week, in Latin America, the Carribean or Europe, but have also used the plan in India.

I upgraded early and got the Droid 2 Global, sticking with a global phone so that I could switch on & off to the International plan. However, sometime at the beginning of the year, Verizon dropped this plan. Now they have some other plans: for an additional $25/month, you get 30 MB, which is not enough, or some other pricier plan: an additional~$100/month gets you significant data (but I forgot how much). However, this is restricted to only some countries. I plan to visit countries which this plan does not cover and the cost will be ~$20/Mb. WHOA! I am kind of disturbed that I bough a global phone where the cost is prohibitive to use. Clearly, I am going to get another unlocked phone (or unlock this one) and use it with a local SIM card. Not what I was hoping for.

Verizon! Give us back the International Data Plan!

Anyone else?

Comments

rbboulder

EXTREMELY unhappy with what they did and other wireless carriers did the same thing. I was in Italy for 7 momnths last year and I was able to have unlimited data on my blackberry with the international plan fo just $64.99 or like $40 extra compared to the domestic plan. It is ridiculous what they are doing now. $100 for a few MB of data is crazy. I will use the wifi to check my data and I will use Skype to communicate using the wifi as well. There are more wifi places opening around the world every day. One of these days, there will be enough of these that will go back to using the cell phones for just voice. If they want to price themselves out of the market so be it.

silver6055

rbboulder wrote:
EXTREMELY unhappy with what they did and other wireless carriers did the same thing. I was in Italy for 7 momnths last year and I was able to have unlimited data on my blackberry with the international plan fo just $64.99 or like $40 extra compared to the domestic plan. It is ridiculous what they are doing now. $100 for a few MB of data is crazy. I will use the wifi to check my data and I will use Skype to communicate using the wifi as well. There are more wifi places opening around the world every day. One of these days, there will be enough of these that will go back to using the cell phones for just voice. If they want to price themselves out of the market so be it.

Yes, I was unhappy but I suspect that they don't really want to be in the international data business anyway. If unlimited is going away on their network domestically, it would make little sense to still have it internationally. Apart from Wifi, especially for multi-month periods, it makes a lot of sense to use a local SIM, which gives you the mobility + much cheaper than the new rates.

MichaelaMC

I'm so mad. I travel to Europe all the time and now the rep tells me that not only there is no such thing as an unlimited data plan, but that they're charging for everything (she told me that just by checking my facebook once, I'd be already using up about 1MB - meaning I'm paying a dollar everytime I check my account). I'll be def. looking for a new carrier just because of this when my contract is up. I've been a loyal customer for about 10 years now and I never cared much for saving too much money by not making international calls, etc, but if Verizon is going to treating their customers this way, I hope people will find better wireless carriers to rely on. This is just awful.

I wouldn't care that much if the pricing was somewhat reasonable, but if I calculate it, it's almost 20x more than it used to be. It is clearly priced at the level that is too prohibitive for people to activate.

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