Wireless costs spiraling out of control

[jseah]

I am with the OP. While doing bills, it has come up many times on going to another provider especially with our bill pushing 200-230 every month. The reason we stay with Verizon is because she and I are opposite on upgrades and the service. Plus I like the phonne choices as well and my next phone will be 4g as hers already is. I will probably renew on a 1 year contract and then decide from there. All I know is Verizon is seriously close to losing 10+ years of customers because the price has skyrocketed!

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Verizon did away with one year contracts at the end of last year. It is two year contracts now, or pay full retail and go with no contract.

 

[DROID11]

Not trying to flame anyone or anything, but this is absolutely not true. The prices have not sky rocketed at all. They've gone down. Think 4 years ago when the only smartphones available for verizon were blackberry and windows phone 6 and old school palm. On BB you were required to get a data plan of $44.99 for b.e.s on wp it was the same, some palms could be activated without a data plan, but most required the 45 bucks a pop. At that point in time the only people who had smartphones were business people and techy type people. Eventually they launched the $30 b.i.s and other smartphones followed suit. The price of data is still $30 it is, however, no longer unlimited.
Also, think texting. In the past you couldnt get unlimited texting it (granted the per text rate was $.10 not $.20 like now). Now the talk and text plans are a mere $30 difference for family plans of up to 5 lines which is only $6/line for unlimited text (vs. The talk only plans).
One more thing: the unlimited plan. When it was first launched, one line of unlimited talk was $99.99 for talk and text it was $119.99. Share plans were worse. $199.99 for 2 lines on talk and $99.99 each additional and I believe it was $229.99 for talk and text plus $99.99 per line. Now it's $69.99 and $89.99 for single lines unlimited talk and unlimited talk and text respectively and $119.99 and $149.99 for 2 lines of talk or talk and text respectively. Also its now only $49.99 to add a line on an unlimited plan.
The plans are now MUCH cheaper than the past. What has changed, is the perception that everyone needs a smartphone.

 

[KJW979]

Not trying to flame anyone or anything, but this is absolutely not true. The prices have not sky rocketed at all. They've gone down. Think 4 years ago when the only smartphones available for verizon were blackberry and windows phone 6 and old school palm. On BB you were required to get a data plan of $44.99 for b.I.s. on wp it was the same, some palms could be activated without a data plan, but most required the 45 bucks a pop. At that point in time the only people who had smartphones were business people and techy type people. Eventually they launched the $30 b.e.s and other smartphones followed suit. The price of data is still $30 it is, however, no longer unlimited.
Also, think texting. In the past you couldnt get unlimited texting it (granted the per text rate was $.10 not $.20 like now). Now the talk and text plans are a mere $30 difference for family plans of up to 5 lines which is only $6/line for unlimited text (vs. The talk only plans).
One more thing: the unlimited plan. When it was first launched, one line of unlimited talk was $99.99 for talk and text it was $119.99. Share plans were worse. $199.99 for 2 lines on talk and $99.99 each additional and I believe it was $229.99 for talk and text plus $99.99 per line. Now it's $69.99 and $89.99 for single lines unlimited talk and unlimited talk and text respectively and $119.99 and $149.99 for 2 lines of talk or talk and text respectively. Also its now only $49.99 to add a line on an unlimited plan.
The plans are now MUCH cheaper than the past. What has changed, is the perception that everyone needs a smartphone.

Point well taken. But still feel in long run they are nickel and diming with all the increased "fees".

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[brad92]

Price went down but now they are rising again. Look at tiered data as an example. Awhile back, Verizon also screwed people (including my plan) by reducing the 2100 minute plan to 2000. Texting plans are really expensive too, especially when you look at how much it actually costs the carrier. Verizon has good coverage yes, so they basically say "pay up and STFU."

A year ago, the top smartphones were $200. Now they're $300. I feel its going to continue to rise. Verizon already has the most overpriced and crappy feature phones available too.

random rom'd X

 

[celtic11]

Hate to say it but people bring this crap on on their own. You think Verizon didn't notice data usage jump when people started hacking their phones and using wireless tethering for free? When people started stealing music and dvds, music and dvd prices went up. People start stealing data and of course Verizon is going to find a way to get their money.

Also, I won't have to worry about this for a while but a lot of people get their 12 year old a smart phone and complain about data prices ( not talking about you specifically, OP, just people in general). The day my child gets a smart phone is the day my child gets a job.

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[TheSwaggeR]

$200 to $300 for new smartphones? Where? That's cheap if you ask me! When I bought the Droid 2 for myself and Droid Incredible for my fiancee both back in September of last year, the total, before plans included, was roughly $560. They took an extra $300 off the total as a sales thing going on. If there was no on sale going on, I would have had to pay close to $900 for both phones. Remember, this was back in September of 2010. Total for both phones and plans was $754. We went with a family plan, cheapest ones and unlimited text and data with 2 year contract.

Now when I read some of the post here, I gotta admit you guys had it way better and cheaper than I do. I pay roughly $232 a month for both phones. More than what most of you admit to paying. I see one person mentioning paying $160 or $200 for 3 phones. You don't feel so bad now do you?

Not to forget to mention, a few months ago, Verizon suddenly started overbilling me and the bill accumulated into $450 extra. I put an end to that. All I got was an apology. I only paid for what I believe was what the actual figure should have been and no extra. Even though I chewed them out and they apologized, the memo must have not been posted to the account and within one month of that mess, they continuously kept shutting our phones off for not paying the $450 that was overbilled.

What did I do? Called my lawyer up, showed her the evidence, she said she will take care of it. A week later I get 3 months free from Verizon to keep it from going to court.

Greedy bastards.

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[celtic11]

$200 to $300 for new smartphones? Where? That's cheap if you ask me! When I bought the Droid 2 for myself and Droid Incredible for my fiancee both back in September of last year, the total, before plans included, was roughly $560. They took an extra $300 off the total as a sales thing going on. If there was no on sale going on, I would have had to pay close to $900 for both phones. Remember, this was back in September of 2010. Total for both phones and plans was $754. We went with a family plan, cheapest ones and unlimited text and data with 2 year contract.

Now when I read some of the post here, I gotta admit you guys had it way better and cheaper than I do. I pay roughly $232 a month for both phones. More than what most of you admit to paying. I see one person mentioning paying $160 or $200 for 3 phones. You don't feel so bad now do you?

Not to forget to mention, a few months ago, Verizon suddenly started overbilling me and the bill accumulated into $450 extra. I put an end to that. All I got was an apology. I only paid for what I believe was what the actual figure should have been and no extra. Even though I chewed them out and they apologized, the memo must have not been posted to the account and within one month of that mess, they continuously kept shutting our phones off for not paying the $450 that was overbilled.

What did I do? Called my lawyer up, showed her the evidence, she said she will take care of it. A week later I get 3 months free from Verizon to keep it from going to court.

Greedy bastards.

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The new 4g phones are $249-$299 with a two year contract. The new 3g phones are $199 with new contract. You either were purchasing phones off contract or your figure of $900 is extremely inflated.

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[stpitcher]

I agree... I'm paying $180/month for two smartphones and a mobile broadband thingy... Seems a lot... and the mobile broadband is limited to 5 gig... which in this day and age, really isn't realisitic. But I guess the wireless companies just don't have the bandwidth that the cable/fiber companies do. 5 gig is ok... I just can't watch movies, etc.

But $180 a month does hurt.

Then, I was amazed how my wife has taken to her new smartphone... (LG Ally) She uses it almost as much as I use mine (DroidX). So I guess it was a worthwhile investment.

- stp

 

[DROID11]

Price went down but now they are rising again. Look at tiered data as an example. Awhile back, Verizon also screwed people (including my plan) by reducing the 2100 minute plan to 2000. Texting plans are really expensive too, especially when you look at how much it actually costs the carrier. Verizon has good coverage yes, so they basically say "pay up and STFU."

A year ago, the top smartphones were $200. Now they're $300. I feel its going to continue to rise. Verizon already has the most overpriced and crappy feature phones available too.

random rom'd X

Verizon went from 2100 to 2000 but dropped the price by $20 and added 10 friends and family members you could call unlimited.
Also, I remember selling a friend of mine a phone for almost $500. He got a mail in rebate for $100, but still phones about 3 years ago were way more expensive than they are now. I spent $300 after $100 instant savings on an lg voyager when it first came out.

Sent from the best phone available aka the HTC Thunderbolt

 

[brad92]

Verizon went from 2100 to 2000 but dropped the price by $20 and added 10 friends and family members you could call unlimited.
Also, I remember selling a friend of mine a phone for almost $500. He got a mail in rebate for $100, but still phones about 3 years ago were way more expensive than they are now. I spent $300 after $100 instant savings on an lg voyager when it first came out.

Sent from the best phone available aka the HTC Thunderbolt

Verizon must be screwing me because my bill did not drop by $20.

Anybody look at Verizon's feature phones lately? To get a decent phone, you have to spend well over $100 on a contract. Maybe their smartphones got cheaper (not really), but the feature phones and multimedia phones are ridiculous.

random rom'd X

 

[jseah]

A year ago, the top smartphones were $200. Now they're $300. I feel its going to continue to rise. Verizon already has the most overpriced and crappy feature phones available too.

But bear in mind that the top smartphones today are much more advanced than the ones from a year ago as well. You can't really judge by the cost of hardware. Years ago, you could get a new car for under $10,000. Now that same car will cost you almost $20,000.

 

[DROID11]

The voyager was a feature phone. Most of Verizon's fearure phones are free or 50-100 tops (after rebates). There used to be flip phones that would go for well over that (Razr, krzr, etc)

Sent from the best phone available aka the HTC Thunderbolt

 

[dezymond]

Indeed smartphone ownership doesn't come at a cheap price, but you gotta pay to play. Smartphones are by no means a necessity, even in today's "connected" world. Yes, as consumers we have the right to complain, but we were also given the choice whether to take on the luxury of owning a smartphone or not. ETF charges on the other hand are for the company's protection, not for the consumer.

Cellular providers realize that they can cash in on smartphones because of how mainstream they've become (you can thank the iPhone for this, as every kid and their mom has one). Today owning a phone means owning a smartphone, and Verizon along with every other company knows this. Throw on the minute plan on top of the data plan and it's easy money. Not to mention how almost everyone has caught onto texting so throw in another $10-$20 on the plan and the monthly payment can easily hover around $100 for one line.

I'm sorry if I come off as a "hater" or accusing you of wrongfully complaining but that's the reality of it. The prices are there for consumer review and the choice is up to you. I mean I've read some articles of how much it really costs to send text and use data, but again, that's the reality of it. The way I see it is that I am fortunate enough to own a smartphone and enjoy it. When the bill comes around i get a "reality check", but I have no regret owning one and am aware that sometimes my spending needs to be worked around what I enjoy having more, my Droid.

 

[KJW979]

I agree its not a necessity, people have & do live without them. Just think that these companies(wireless) know that people want them whether they can afford them or not, so since cell phones are such the "rage" these days they will take advantage of the average consumer anyway they can & we do it. I would love to pick up one of the "supposedly" new phones on the horizon but will wait 6-12 months when prices are reduced. Still have my OG Droid which I got for 49 dollars but about a year after out, love this phone. I'm sure I'll never give my smartphone up as I do everything on it but at rate going may have to re-think that stance.

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[TheSwaggeR]

The new 4g phones are $249-$299 with a two year contract. The new 3g phones are $199 with new contract. You either were purchasing phones off contract or your figure of $900 is extremely inflated.

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I'm guessing you failed to read my entire post. We are on a 2 year contract. That should have given you the clear message of what we paid for to begin with. Kid, I was there to pay for the phones and plans. I was there to see the $300 knocked off of the total cost for the phones itself. Why do you insist to beg different when you weren't there and I was? Hell, I've got all the receipts still. Your response, to my post, is dumb. No offense.

But now that you're saying this, I'll go ahead and label you a complainer. Why? Well you brought this to our attention. When I ran into issues with Verizon, I sure didn't make a thread about it. I went ahead and challenged Verizon with my evidence.

Bottom line, if you're unsatisfied, either switch carriers, switch to a non-contract phone, or challenge your carrier for their unjustified rates and fees.

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