Slashdot Mirror
Verizon To Hike Prices On Plans But Offer More Data (cnet.com)
Roger Cheng, reporting for CNET: Big changes are afoot at Verizon. The nation's largest wireless carrier is set to unveil changes to its plans that will make them more expensive, but will also include more data, according to someone familiar with the changes. The low-end "S" plan will go up by $5 to $35 a month, but will include 2 gigabytes of data, twice as much as before. The "M" plan will go up by $5 to $50 a month, while its data will rise from 3GB to 4GB. The "L" plan will go up by $10 to $70 a month, while data increases from 6GB to 8GB. The "XL" plan will go up by $10 to $90 a month, but you'll get 16GB, up from 12GB before. Lastly, the "XXL" plan will cost $10 more at $110 a month, but you will get 24GB instead of 18GB. The changes are part of a broader overhaul of its plans, which will also include a rollover data program called "Carryover Data," a new way to avoid overage fees, and better access to Canada and Mexico. The move reflects a heightened competitive environment, one in which smaller rivals T-Mobile and Sprint have begun winning away customers through aggressive offers. Many of these changes mimic offers already available at the other carriers.
Outrageous.
People don't want more data.
Why doesn't the FTC stop this?
We're in an extremely competitive environment these days. What should we do? Hike rates! yeah, that's the ticket!
And made them tone deaf, because the idea of raising prices even with a new program to allow rollover data is a non-starter in the U.S. market, which already has some of the highest cellular fees in the world.
This will actually save me $10 a month. The 1GB plan was too small so I was forced into the 'M' 3GB plan which was $15 more a month and larger than I needed. With the new changes for only $5 more a month I will get a 2GB which is perfect.
Therefore, we're going to jack up your prices.
So Verizon is going to compete by raising prices. We already know that giving us more data doesn't cost them anything. Google fi here I come
$5 to $35 is a huge range for the rate increase. Couldn't they narrow it down a little more?
Three days from now?? Thats tomorrow!! ~Peter Griffin
Pay more for a little bit more of what you used to get for free.
If you calculate it as $s per gigabyte. WIth this change I can actually save money by lower my data plan to the 4GB plan. 3GB was just about our monthly data usage, but 4GB should give me enough overhead to not worry about overages.
Verizon is an ISP... Data is free to them. This is simply a way to extract more money out of customers...
Shouldn't that be "and"?
Please people... learn your conjunctions for cryin' out loud.
(Damn... now I have that old "conjunction junction" song stuck in my head).
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Unlimited Data. $50 a month. Roaming data in 100+ countries. Free rental of WiFI router.
I'm glad that Verizon is being forced to acknowledge that customers are beings other than walking wallets, but TMobile is just better., Sorry.
Bloody hell. Here in the newly-independent UK[1], £11 per month gets me 1GB of data, among other things. Another £3 per month turns that into unlimited data. ANOTHER £2 per month turns that into unlimited data with 4GB of data usable by a device tethered to the phone. That's right, £16 per month for unlimited data on the phone and 4GB for tethered devices. "Heightened competitive environment"? Could still use some work, I think. [1] Yes, yes, I know.
Slashdot - News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters, in ISO-8859-1 Has just realised that beta makes this signature redundant
Apparently they haven't actually looked at their competition, because other than AT&T, the trend has been more for less.....not more for more.
In case anyone is unfamiliar with AT&T / Verizon pricing, these fees are in addition to the 'device' charges, which run ~$20-25/mo per connected phone.
So Verizon is offering a marginally less pathetic amount of data for a marginally more outrageous sum of money. Hooray?
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
Maybe we're thinking about this the wrong way. Verizon revenue is about $32 billion and their profits about $4.4 Billion. How many customers do they have? If we could get reliable data and do the math, it would show how much profit they are making per customer.
I'm not a US citizen so in a sense this is not directly relevant, but across the world the mobile telcos seem to be pushing up prices, charging huge roaming premiums and raking in massive profits, yet, curiously, it doesn't seem to be resulting in a better service...
Does anyone know how much it's costing them to maintain enough bandwidth? Is this a genuine "cost of doing business" or is this "squeeze 'em till the pips squeak"???
.
So it looks like Verizon jacking up their prices while the costs are remaining the same.
Pure profit for Verizon.
"Safety mode" eliminates the prospect of an overage fee, and reduces the speed of the service until the end of the month....Customers with smaller plans can pay $5 extra to access "safety mode."
"a new way to avoid overage fees" by paying a fee
I am paying $55 a month for unlimited data, and last month alone i used over 100GB, which is the most i have ever used in a month.
I get it. So they just changed everyone to be half a plan above where they chose to be. If these people wanted more data, then they'd have chosen those more expensive plans with more data, but they didn't, so Verizon chose for them. It's like ordering a medium size and they say "oh, we give you more than medium, so you pay us more, no? Don't break contract or you pay us more then too. Have a nice day."
I won't use Verizon mobile because of poor policies like this. I have a non-verizon plan that has unlimited data... but only the first 3GB is fast. After that, it's slower. I asked Verizon how I could make sure I don't pay more than my budget for data and they said I could have them turn off all data at 3GB or pay their relatively expensive overage charges. So they won't have my business.
Just got a Google Fi phone and plan. Can't wait to dump Verizon for good once my contract expires in 2 months.
That is unlimited data at 2G speeds (around 100kbps usually), 2GB of data at 4G speeds. I love T-Mobile and have been a customer for quite some time but it isn't unlimited data in the sense many people would expect. On their base $50 plan you get as high a speed as the network can support for the first 2GB of data, then they throttle it down to a slower speed.
If you want unlimited (barring abuse, if you go too nuts they still might throttle) high speed data that is another $45/month.
Their base plan is the best plan going though. Really these days I think many people will find 2GB more than sufficient since WiFi is everywhere.
Two months ago we decided to put service on our daughter's old iPhone. Verizon wouldn't simply let me add a $15/month line to our shared pool of data - they said my plan was "too old". Instead they wanted me to switch to a new plan, which would have raised my monthly total cost by $35/month.
Instead I moved my mom, wife, sister and daughter all to TMobile. We are spending $30/month less with an added phone and more data to boot. Binge-on is also nice since daughter and wife use youtube and Pandora quite a lot.
The coverage isn't quite as good as Verizon - but it is good enough.
I just want a cheap yearly plan for minimal calls.
No data. No frills. No fancy phones. No cement ponds.
Give me 10 brief calls (5 minutes or less) a month and I'm done.
I hate all of the Pay-Go plans because I end up with thousands of minutes I don't and will never use.
Yeah, I know, I'm a terrible person, but the fact is, I hate using a cellphone, and only use it for the occasional incident where they are desirable.
If I could move to anyone but Verizon, I would. Unfortunately, no other carrier has decent signal where I live and work. Looks like I'm stuck.
but allows use of a "smartphone", with data via wifi, without the smartphone 'tax' (mandatory data plan)?
It took me 4 phone calls + a trip into an official Verizon store and threatening to tell everybody inside about the deal before they would give it to me, but you can still get onto traditional 2yr contracts under Verizon loyalty and rewards programs if you twist enough arms.
I've got a massively overpriced 4 handset business contract that I'm tied into for another 12 months and even I winced at those prices.
Even on Slashvertisement posts like this one!
In the UK you have a wealth of choice - for £15 (less that $20, even in post-Brexit money) I get 1,000 national minutes to mobiles or landlines, unlimited SMS, 4Gb of data and FREE calls to other users of my network...
I left verizon because they rarely update the device's system software and when they did the primary purpose seemed to be to lock down the bootloader more and more. Yes, most users don't give a hoot, but that's my case.
Why would someone pay $50 for 2gb a month when straight talk is unlimited (5gb) at high speed over verizons own towers?
have been on this plan for years.
first 5gb is 4G thereafter it's 2G.
i've been on T-mobile $30 unlimited data plan for years
first 5gb is 4G thereafter it's 2G.
available at Walmart
I don't know about anybody else, but my data usage fluctuates pretty widely based on unpredictable travel and other circumstances. For my family, Ting (mentioned above) works out well -- I'm sure my son would love to be able to stream all the time over cellular data, but he's bearing up well under the strain of his deprivation. If we have to spend a week or two on the road, we'll bump up into another data bucket, and pay an extra $10 or so at the end of the month. If not, we get the usual low rate we expect. Same for minutes and messages.
I was on Verizon years ago, and clung to a very old plan with very old flip-phones because I knew pay-as-you-go had to be coming soon. It took a bit longer than I expected, but it eventually arrived, and I couldn't have been happier to kiss Verizon goodbye.
At T-MO my data rate is simply lowered when I go over instead of being charged an extra $1/meg or whatever insane shit VZ is still running. They are so far behind their competitors its like the twilight zone over there. So glad I switched.
Second post
That's when my 2 year Verizon contract runs out and I dump them for T-Mobile and an iPhone 7. I would rather do business with a company that competes by providing better service (free music streaming) than do business with a company that competes by cranking up prices. I'm surprised Comcast hasn't purchased Verizon, they seem like they do business the same way as one another.
-==- Buy a Mac and leave me alone!
Verizon (UUNET) is a Tier 1 provider, meaning they do not buy transit from other ISPs. Data is not a finite resource, and therefore whether Joe Blow uses 3 or 4GB of data a month, it doesn't cost Verizon any differently.
It's not the data, it's the bandwidth that is the expensive limited commodity. Never head of the FTC frequency slot auctions? (Billions of $) Neither are cell towers free; they are bandwidth-limited also..
What we have here is a prime example in the wild of some mangina who doesn't whip his kids. I don't want to hear your bitching. You spared the rod and now you've got a spoiled ass child. It's your own damn fault.
And none of that changes the fact that whether Joe Blow uses 3 or 4GB of data a month, the cost to Verizon is the same.
The data costs them nothing, but increasing the allotment is a good way to excuse putting the price up. As a non American, those prices are horrendous.