<p>I think this will be a decent deal for my family. Four of us – three with smart phones, one with dumb. For each smart phone, we pay $30 per month for unlimited data, which we don’t actually need. I can buy 4 GB of data (which I think, according to Verizon’s data calculator, is sufficient) for $80 a month. I could upgrade the dumb phone to a smart one and use the same plan. (The family member who has the dumb phone won’t have any idea how to use data, so I’m not concerned about that increasing the data usage.)</p>
<p>This thread, among other things, has taught me that I have a “dumb” phone. 
Great lingo!!! </p>
<p>I had hoped this new option would somehow allow us to get S a smart phone to make our household 3 smart, 2 dumb, but it appears like njfootballmom said, that we will pay more. OMG, I am NOT paying anymore per month!!!
(this thought confirmed by the Verizon bill I got today that makes me shake my head already!!!)</p>
<p>I had read that this announcement was coming so encouraged my D to upgrade her phone at Verizon last weekend. She was eligible for an upgrade under the two year rule (which is actually less than 2 years, I think they let you do it several months early) and we definitely wanted to keep unlimited data. Just to give you an idea, she got a Iphone 4S with 32GB and a case, charger and car charger. The total cost with tax was $416. I assume you can get the new phone with the discounted price (if eligible) and keep unlimited data until June 28th. My thought was that we can always change to a new plan but we wouldn’t have the option of the old plan if we waited.</p>
<p>Just for datapoint, my youngest has an iphone4, she has 2gb data on her plan, hasn’t come close to using it all.
I have unlimited, as I am the only one who already had a smartphone when they did away with those plans.</p>
<p>So now I’m wondering…will you have the CHOICE to stick with your current prices/plans? We have 5 phones, 2 smart, 3 dumb - 700 minutes and unlimited texting. Smart phones have 2G of data each I think which seems to be plenty. Can we stick with that? And is this new plan saying we would have to pay $30/month for dumb phones when we now pay the 9.99 per line for dumb???</p>
<p>My mother (78 years old) would FALL OVER if she heard how much we pay month for our phones. Ridiculous!</p>
<p>You can keep your current plan as long as you want at this point. The catch is when you buy a new phone, you would have to pay retail price, no subsidy.</p>
<p>Can we buy a used phone from another person and just have VZ activate it as our new phone? (thinking if I ever want a smart phone, I could just use the 3G phone my husband will soon abandon. probably not going to happen, as I see myself getting a tablet and keeping my ‘dumb’ phone.)</p>
<p>PS - am I the only person that thinks smart phones are too big? I like to be able to put my dumb LG phone in the back pocket of my running shorts. No way any smart phone would fit!</p>
<p>I’m getting so confused…so now there will never be discounts for phones??? Or no phone discounts if you go with this new “shared family” stuff? Or…</p>
<p>I despise going to the Verizon store to have this explain…</p>
<p>Verizon users. Does anyone know an EASY way to go into the Verizon site and find your TOTAL data usage across all phones for the past few billing periods? (I find the Verizon wireless site to be my idea of hell.) Really, do I have to add up all 5 lines?</p>
<p>To be honest, I don’t know how this plan affects me, since I have NO IDEA how much data I/we use. For all I know it could save me money (but I doubt it). We have a couple lines eligible for upgrades. I’ll replace my phone and re-up my unlimited plan for another 2 years if it makes sense.</p>
<p>njmom - You can most certainly buy a used phone. Just remember for Verizon it needs to be a CDMA or LTE phone to work on their network. Additionally, if you are buying from someone you don’t know, be careful to make sure they give you the ESN so you can check that it isn’t stolen. Even that isn’t a guarantee so just be careful.</p>
<p>abasket - they will still have upgrade discounts, however you must change your plan to the new ones to get them. If you want to keep your old plan, you buy at full cost.</p>
<p>Thanks Trojan…so if I have an older phone but want to keep my current plan should I run to Verizon before June 28 and replace my dumb phone with another dumb phone (if I don’t plan on getting “smart”???</p>
<p>One of the people I worked with who has a similar situation to myself (3 smartphones, 2 dumb phones and a MiFi) called yesterday to find out how her bill would change. The customer service people told her they have no information and aren’t sure when they will have information.</p>
<p>Not sure what your current plan is but by my calculations:
Access fee 120 for the Smartphones, 60 for the dumb phones, 20 for the Mifi = $200</p>
<p>The data is the tricky bit. I’d recommend monitoring the smartphones to see how much data you normally use. 1 Gig is $50, 2 is $60, 4 is $70 I’d say with 3 phones you would need at minimum 2 gigs but probably closer to 4. So that would be $260 or $270 a month before any corporate discounts.</p>
<p>What do you use the mifi for? Because now they will let you use your smartphones as a hotspot, so if that is something that can work for you, that’s $20 you can cut.</p>
<p>I am mad mainly because the price difference between smart and dumb is only $10. It makes you want to get the smart phones, but for the 3 of us who have dumb now that adds up to 30 more, then we’d need more data…</p>
<p>Will I be able to switch out a dumb phone for a used iphone without switching plans? What data options would then be available? I think I’d still get nailed to the new plan. My niece is on the plan. Her bday is in July and she is only 14 so the plan was another dumb phone, but this plan makes it seem like only $10 more and she can go smart. We’d limit her data share. With old plan it was $30 more, so she wasn’t getting a smart phone.</p>
<p>I hope we can stay on the old plan. Verizon needs to lower the dumb phone price when it is on a plan with smart phones.</p>
<p>Can 2 families get together and share one plan? If you have 10 people, you can get $40/phone + $100 for 10GB. That’s $50/person for 1GB of data, unlimited texting, and unlimited calling. That would be the only way for it to even seem reasonable to me.</p>
<p>How is it that they can lock us into 2-year subscriptions, then drop/change their plan offerings?</p>
<p>Family, why not? At one point, we had my ex and best friend on our plan. How can they prove you’re not family?</p>
<p>The only problem is making sure you get everyone to pay their share of you’re stuck paying the huge bill by yourself. Some plans have a maximum # of whom is included in “family.”</p>
<p>They haven’t announced if there is any way to ration the data per device.</p>
<p>If not, when your kid downloads an HD movie over LTE and wipes out your entire data quota for the month, you are screwed.</p>
<p>I think we would about break even with 2 smart and 2 dumb phones, but only because we are already on the 2000 minute plan (DW lives on the phone for her job). Unlimited talk is a minor win since DW occasionally gets near the 2000 minute limit. But it is hard to compare because DW has unlimited data and DD has 2 GB.</p>
<p>It does make it slightly cheaper to upgrade from a dumb phone - $20/month ($10 extra for the phone, $10 for an extra 2Gb of data), but for most people I think this plan will cost significantly more than what they are paying now.</p>
<p>It’s all about revenue enhancement.</p>
<p>Also unknown is how this is going to effect corporate discounts.</p>
<p>Currently we get my corporate discount on the primary plan ($120/month) plus one data plan ($30/month), for a total of $150.</p>
<p>If, under the new plan, you get the discount on the data plan plus one phone, that would be around $110/month. So we would lose the 17% discount on $40/month, which would be an extra $81/year right into Verizon’s pocket.</p>
<p>Times millions of corporate discounts…</p>
<p>Cha-ching.</p>
<p>Ok, help me please as I am SO confused. This is what we have right now:</p>
<p>Husband’s smart phone- around 100 dollars including all the taxes and feesI I can’t remember the minutes but with friends and family we have tons left over. He gets 250 texts and never comes close, For his data, I’ve looked at the bills and he only uses 150,000 to 200,000 kbs each month</p>
<p>Internet hot spot- 60 dollars- unlimited data . We use about 15GB each month right now!!!</p>
<p>My dumb phone- 15 dollarsincludes 400 minutes and 250 texts ( never use all of it)</p>
<p>Son’s dumb phone- 15 dollars includes 400 minutes and 250 texts ( comes close to text limit)</p>
<p>So our total biill for all of that is 190 dollars.</p>
<p>So… my husband NEEDS a new smart phone. His is 3 years old and starting to lose his e-mail and data. It is dropping calls and as a doctor is not acceptable. So if he gets it before the end of June then we can keep our current plan, correct? </p>
<p>Now here is another wrinkle… Our middle son turns 16 in March and then he will get his own dumb phone. ( In our family, when you are 16 and driving you may have a phone.) But the thing is I don’t think we can get another 15 dollar dumb phone… In fact, I think they were going to make us change our contract, but we really need the unlimited data on the internet…</p>
<p>Don’t tell me to choose another provider because Verizon is the only provider that works out here. ( Ask our friends and families with other carriers that can’t get it to work out here in our rural area!! My sister works for AT&T and has to drive down the road when she visits to a local church so she can get her messages and/or make a call. )</p>
<p>HELP!!!</p>