Many feel it's very unfair that some get preferential treatment, and others don't. You're certainly welcome to have your own opinion of that, as am I and others. For me, if I went to a gym and paid $50 for one month, only to find out others are getting 24 hour access at $50/year you can better believe I would have a very poignant discussion with management and would either get a significant discount or leave.
Explain how being a long time subscriber and having a grandfathered plan is preferential treatment?
Just because they no longer offer something that I have doesn't make it unfair? Companies discontinue promotions or offerings all the time. Verizon has a policy of allowing anyone to keep a grandfathered plan.
As for the gym you would leave. There are plenty of 24 Hour Fitness people that got in early and paid $300 introductory and were grandfathered in at $50-100/year. They don't offer it anymore but they can't discontinue it either. I pay about $240/year and have unlimited access at all clubs owned by 24 Hour. There are people that are going to be bent, so be it.
I know this and understand it happens all the time. That doesn't mean people have to like it. Now, if it's an introductory pricing that goes for a period of time and then reverts to the standard pricing like most do, it's a tough argument to consider it preferential treatment. Cable companies do it all the time. New customers and new contracts get the "triple play" for $99/month, but that ends at the one year anniversary on a 2 year contract.
As for UDP, these aren't "grandfathered" in the true sense of the word since there was ALWAYS an abuse clause in the TOS, from the first day they were offered. It's a part of the original contracts and so even if someone used in excess of perhaps 100GB immediately after signing the contract Verizon could have exercised that clause, but they didn't. Verizon is simply exercising that TOS clause now, and I think they're being VERY generous by only exercising it on those exceeding 100GB/month, at a comparatively expensive $450/month 100GB plan pricing. What I'm saying is it's only UNLIMITED, to the extent that it doesn't violate the TOS. This is a push to eject the violators, and at that only those who violated "well in excess".
Personally a gym membership doesn't equate a cellular subscription in my mind anyway. One is a life-line and could potentially prevent a crime, save my life or the life of my wife, or another citizen if attacked or during a natural or man-made disaster, terrorism, etc., helping keep my wife and son safe, give my son peace of mind as an Asperger's with separation anxiety, give me access to tremendous resources for news, shopping, education, emergency medical advice, etc... The other, I can sweat with a lot of other sweating people on a piece of equipment that I also have in my basement and can do in private.
Actually it is a good analogy. A cell phone isn't mandatory in any way shape or form.
I know people that don't have them and don't want them.
I never said it was mandatory. It's a personal choice, but I'm saying it carries with it far greater value IMHO than does a gym membership. But we both used that to prove a greater point so perhaps it wasn't fair to rebut as I did. There are plenty of other analogies we could use, as for instance the cable "triple play".
I actually agree with this for the most part. If they'd done this long ago they would have stopped all the rhetoric and prevented a lot of bad publicity. Who knows, they might even have greater membership. Still, it's the few who ruin it for the many.
People using it like they were sold, is not "ruining it".
I disagree. If the service provider says they reserve the right to suspend or terminate service for abuse under certain defined reasons, and users abuse under those reasons, then Verizon has every right to suspend or terminate at any time, with prejudice, only those who they deem committed the abuse. In this example, people who used 200GB/month, or those who used it as a replacement for a home ISP may have "ruined it" for those who only used 150GB and who used it only on their phones.
Sure, not kicking them off reduces churn, but I really don't think it benefits the company all that much, other than preventing fallout. It takes money to push data, and the more data you push, the more money it takes. Some people seem to think that once the bandwidth equipment is in place, there's no difference in cost between 1TB/second and 2TB/second from cellular towers. Unfortunately they are mistaken. The more data being pushed, the more POWER in Watts being pushed out of those antennas it takes. Power uses electricity - something Verizon has to pay the local electric power company for.
It benefits them in a huge way. Forcing people off a plan to do something different where they must look at cost of minutes, texts, and data absolutely would increase churn. This is exactly why they don't make people chose a new plan when an old one goes away. It also would increase their costs to manage transition to new plans whenever a plan went away.
I agree (as I did before), that it would increase "churn" or attrition, and that would bring added costs and lost revenue. But we're still trying to compare UDP with other non-UDP plans and it just doesn't work. UDP had no "known" upper limit to use. Still, like another member illustrated some will use "all-you-can-eat buffets" at extreme quantities and the results are that everyone suffers eventually. This is really no different, in my opinion. Besides, many who are using those extremely high data rates are directly violating the TOS by using it as an ISP for home, wireless tethering these phones to laptops and Chromecasts, and Rokus and on and on... This is enough of a reason to cut them off IMHO.
Greater data also requires more support staff, which translates into salaries, benefits, insurance protection, equipment, etc. There are a myriad of added expenses for each TB of data transmitted and although the average (or aggregate) costs per TB do go down with greater amounts, the TOTAL costs still go up. Just like any business, cost accounting is in play here, and those who use excessive amounts are hitting that balance sheet significantly harder than others.
Wrong. Greater data does not create more costs. As network equipment is replaced no additional cost for increased bandwidth is needed. That's like saying there is increased cost when a company deploys faster routers. Unless their equipment footprint changes, there is no incremental cost to deliver the data. I would argue that once deployed the cost for 1TB or 20TB of transmitted data doesn't change. Now building of the infrastructure may cost but once in place there is no incremental cost for delivering data.
I worked for PacBell before they were acquired by SBC. I worked in their Wire Center Planning department. That department predicted line growth and new switch deployment and replacement.
Cost to manage a network has nothing to do with the data transmitted. It is based on the equipment installed.
I don't want to argue this point, since I don't have direct experience as you apparently do, however I do know from my days in shortwave radio (as 94lt1 eluded to), that more Watts of power transmission takes more Watts of electric power. Transmitting more data uses more Watts. Watts are not free, they have a cost in electricity and there's always additional overhead in loss from inefficiencies, heat, etc. But as you even said, more bandwidth has the added costs of new switches, deployment and replacement. This cost has to come from somewhere. If all your UDP customers were sucking down data (against the TOS), to the point where you had to add equipment in order to service the rest of your subscribers, is it fair to charge the other subscribers for the acquisition costs? I think not.
I don't believe it will ever get to a 10GB threshold, or even 25. By then the plans would be no longer cost effective against similarly priced tiered plans and they would go away with attrition. In fact, right now, my plan would be closer to 40GB in a tiered plan once you add in all the per-phone fees I pay along with other things that are wrapped into the tiered flat pricing plans. I did the comparison.
Right now moving to a tiered plan with four lines of unlimited data would give me less for more money.
And there will always be some for whom moving is better and for others worse. The real question is, are you using more than 400GB/month right now, or perhaps better said, are there any of your lines exceeding 100GB? If not, then you have nothing to worry about.
I was never "forced" to take UDP. There were plenty of alternative plans available but for me with 4 phones at that time, it made the most sense. There were some months where I paid well in excess of $600 per month in the previous non-UDP plans going back as much as 20 years ago. The UDP plan when it came out, was a HUGE discount for me since it gave me at that time, 1,400 minutes of voice for one flat fee between all 4 phones (which is where the previous plan was leeching me), plus Friends and Family for 10 frequently called numbers (also a huge benefit), and Mobile to Mobile free. Unlimited Data was simply an added benefit which I didn't even really benefit from until just these last few years.
Verizon forced unlimited on customers in Nov 2008.
Verizon Makes Data Plans Mandatory on Smartphones
(The link also has a thread about how people were miffed that Verizon was forcing a $30 surcharge on every smart phone).
People with phones purchased before Nov 2008, were grandfathered on their old plans.
If you wanted a phone sold after Nov. 2008, you were forced to take a $29.99 data plan.
I know, I have had a smartphone on Verizon since 2006.
So I had my plan long before that and I was grandfathered. So for me, fortunately, I was not one who was forced to take UDP. I am honestly empathetic that you and others in that era were, but there's nothing I can do about it. Even more important, if they're not using over 100GB/month/line then they're still not being kicked off UDP and onto a tiered plan. We all have to remember, this is ONLY for those who are the top 1/2% of the top 1% of 144,700,000+ subscribers. It's a VERY select few over all and only those who are going to be affected really have a gripe, whether justified or not.
Maybe you thought that it was a nice choice, but make no mistake Verizon forced unlimited data on users. Even people at the time that used WiFi were not given that as an option. I asked and was denied.
And so you and the link have evidenced. So again, I empathize with you and them. Are they better now on UDP or on a tiered pricing plan. In MANY cases (maybe not your's mind you), they are better on the tier'd plan.
I just checked and I could get 24GB with Safety Mode and Carryover Minutes for $40/month less than I'm paying now, and once my son's phone falls off his one-year contract in December, I'd get another $20/month lower bill going forward. In other words, net $60/month savings for 3X the average data cap that I'm consuming as a family now. If I moved to 16GB, I'd save another $20/month. For me, the extra 8GB for $20 makes more sense, however Verizon will let me move up or down in plan any month and will give me the new cap at the respective price retroactive to the beginning of the billing period.
This means, I can't be charged overage fees, I can always increase the data cap fo 4G if need be on a month by month basis, and can benefit from any unused data each month for the next month. Not only that, but I'd then be eligible for new Motorola Moto Z Force phones for two of the lines at an out of pocket cost of $20 plus tax each at purchase and a monthly payment of $30 each for 24 months, or in other words, a net zero cost with two brand new phones
For the first time in a while, I'm once again considering making the move from UDP anyway.
