I am going to UK for two weeks, and the trip spans two billing cycles. Can I change from Unlimited Welcome to Unlimited Ultimate before I go, and change back to Unlimited Welcome when I return (2 weeks later)? If I do that, will I be charged for two full months of Unlimited Ultimate because it spans two billing cycles, or will both bills be prorated?
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@SynthpopAddict wrote:I've never heard of any mobile bills being prorated like this (I've been with 3 different carriers) and it's always been my experience you get billed by the month whether you used the whole month or not after unsuccessfully arguing this with the 2 other carriers I used over billing issues. If you change your plan mid-month you might even get double billed for both Unlimited Welcome and Unlimited Ultimate if the change took place in the middle of a billing cycle. 😱
Prorated bills are a thing with Verizon Wireless and AT&T. I have seen on my own bills with both. It's less of an issue these days with most of the plans being some form of unlimited calls, text, and data. It was especially an issue when plans had limits on any one thing or all three things.
For example, in 2010 I initially didn't have texting with my plan. I added the feature mid cycle. The texting feature usually had a 250 text message allowance for $5.00 per month, but because I added it 10 days before I ended my current cycle I was only allowed 83 messages for those 10 days. Thankfully I didn't go over that prorated allowance. Also since I didn't backdate the feature addition, I was charged $0.20 per message for the 20 messages I sent or received before the feature was added. That increased my bill by $4.00 and would have been double if I hadn't added the feature. This is just one example of how prorated bills happen.
I'm most definitely NOT a VZW employee. If a post answered your question, please mark it as the answer.
I've never heard of any mobile bills being prorated like this (I've been with 3 different carriers) and it's always been my experience you get billed by the month whether you used the whole month or not after unsuccessfully arguing this with the 2 other carriers I used over billing issues. If you change your plan mid-month you might even get double billed for both Unlimited Welcome and Unlimited Ultimate if the change took place in the middle of a billing cycle. 😱
@SynthpopAddict wrote:I've never heard of any mobile bills being prorated like this (I've been with 3 different carriers) and it's always been my experience you get billed by the month whether you used the whole month or not after unsuccessfully arguing this with the 2 other carriers I used over billing issues. If you change your plan mid-month you might even get double billed for both Unlimited Welcome and Unlimited Ultimate if the change took place in the middle of a billing cycle. 😱
Prorated bills are a thing with Verizon Wireless and AT&T. I have seen on my own bills with both. It's less of an issue these days with most of the plans being some form of unlimited calls, text, and data. It was especially an issue when plans had limits on any one thing or all three things.
For example, in 2010 I initially didn't have texting with my plan. I added the feature mid cycle. The texting feature usually had a 250 text message allowance for $5.00 per month, but because I added it 10 days before I ended my current cycle I was only allowed 83 messages for those 10 days. Thankfully I didn't go over that prorated allowance. Also since I didn't backdate the feature addition, I was charged $0.20 per message for the 20 messages I sent or received before the feature was added. That increased my bill by $4.00 and would have been double if I hadn't added the feature. This is just one example of how prorated bills happen.
I'm most definitely NOT a VZW employee. If a post answered your question, please mark it as the answer.
Thank you both for your replies!
You're welcome, and a big thanks to Ann154 for the detailed posts! I'm a prepaid customer with Verizon, and don't get the benefit of being able to prorate anything, so I also appreciate the information since I'm here a lot and it helps me with answering questions in the future.
Of my past experiences, one company was a budget carrier, and with those companies I think they treat all customers like "prepaid" since nobody has a contract. The Pink Logo Place, I couldn't get the hang of their billing practices for postpaid customers, and my postpaid stay there was very short-lived for a variety of reasons.
Makes me wonder why more people don't do this with their plan then instead of paying for Travel Pass or International Service Plan.
It depends. Some people don't want to change their base plan especially if they have a retired plan. Before, the plans didn't have international coverage so adding the travel pass or the international plan was the options available. For others, planning and setting up a plan change and then reversing is as challenging as going to the dentist or some other thing a person hates to do.
I'm most definitely NOT a VZW employee. If a post answered your question, please mark it as the answer.
If you change your plan mid cycle to a more expensive plan so it becomes effective in that billing cycle, you should select to backdate the change to the beginning of the current billing cycle. The next bill you receive will have a credit for the previous plan charge and a new charges for the new plan covering the previous cycle and a separate charge for the current cycle as part of the bill.
If you don't backdate and make the changes effective immediately, you will still see partial credits and partial charges for the mid cycle changes. This is what is called a prorated bill. Depending on features of either plan, portions of those plans could cause additional charges if you went over the prorated calculated allowances during the partial month billing cycles of the two different plans.
I'm most definitely NOT a VZW employee. If a post answered your question, please mark it as the answer.
For the month you return, I would suggest that you schedule the plan change back to your normal plan to start at the next billing cycle. This is called future dating the change.
I'm most definitely NOT a VZW employee. If a post answered your question, please mark it as the answer.
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