[Motorola Droid RAZR] Ohmster:
Verizon Unlimited Data goes up $20/Mo. November 15

If you have Elton John, Funeral for a Friend, now is a good time to play it...

Just got off the phone with Verizon. The unlimited data plans that some of us have and love so much will be going up in price as of November 15th 2015. My phone bill now is $150/Mo. and this will go up to $170/Mo. next month. As much as I love this unlimited, I will not be able to keep it. Not at that price, not at the old price either I'm afraid. My last month usage was 44 minutes voice, maybe 15 text messages, and 1.6 Gb data. That is NOT worth paying $150 for. Every month my usage is similar, yet I pay so much for the warm and fuzzy blanket of unlimited data. And the truth is, in all the several years I have had unlimited, I have never really used more than maybe 3 Gb in a month, if that.

Nice to have, NOT so nice to pay for, especially when I have never once used enough data to make it worth paying the $150 phone bill. Actual bill is $120/Mo. Rest of the money is taxes, surcharge, $5 insurance, $5 late fee. The new plan I am considering is $45 a month for unlimited voice and text, 3 Gb data. You can change your plan online, by phone, or call at any time so if I needed say, 12 Gb for $80, I could take that plan for a month, eat up that data, and drop back to my original plan the next month. My new phone bill would be about $90/Mo. instead of the $150. for 3 Gb of data. Others would be cheaper, depending on your state and if you did not pay insurance and a late fee, you can take $10 off that bill. Since I am always a month late on the bill, I could catch up now and take another $5 a month off my bill by ditching the late fee. I have to take it, man, an $85 phone bill instead of $150, sweet! Gotta have it!

The rep did say that unlimited is going up by $20 a month for *everyone* as of November 15th and it will continue to rise as the years go by. All cellphone companies are trying to phase out the unlimited plans. Too many 9 year olds on the phone watching Ninja Turtles in HD for the entire month that is eating up so much bandwidth that they cannot offer it anymore.

Here is the Current Verizon Plan Information. I think I will take the Medium plan.

As far as a new phone goes, Verizon will allow anyone to get a new phone and split the bill into 24 payments that go on your monthly bill. A $600 phone would cost an extra $25/Mo. for two years to pay it off. If I were to volunteer a down payment of say, $200, then I would only pay about $16/Mo for 2 years instead. Not bad, not bad at all. There are no promos for me right now on a new phone that I know of other than the financing.

Good News: Verizon charges an extra $20/Mo. for tethering. The current rooted roms like cm11 allow tethering for free. But with limited data, time to start setting the data alarm on the phone to keep it in check. ;)

Man, I feel like I am at a funeral right now, very, very, very sad. :crying:

It is a really great feeling to have this unlimited plan, but not once in the past 3 years have I ever gotten my money's worth out of it because I just do not need it. I love the idea that I can tether my phone to the PC and watch online HD for an entire month and not pay a dime extra for it, but I never, ever do it. I have used it when the power went off on my laptop to watch internet HDTV for the entire night, but then the power came back on next day and there was no need for it.

If I had a really good job and made a LOT of money every week, I would keep the unlimited data, but not for $170/Mo. I have to draw the line somewhere and that is it. And that is what my phone bill will be after November 15th, even if I do not use the phone at all. Time to rethink the unlimited data for life plan. I simply cannot afford it nor do I *ever* use that much data to make it worth it. Everybody pays another 20 bucks a month, like it or not. :(

P.S. I am not going to do this for at least a month since I just paid the bill. But all of you have good insight and thoughts on the matter and I want to hear your feedback before committing to anything. You are all very intelligent and collectively, we have a great source of strength in this thread. Your input would be greatly appreciated. Are you going to keep unlimited? What plan would you take? :confused: