Verizon Will Force Customers Switching to LTE Off Their Unlimited Data Plan
LIKE
TWEET
SHARE
PIN
SHARE
POST
MAIL
MORE
Posted May 16, 2012 at 6:39pm by iClarified
Verizon plans to force grandfathered customers off their unlimited data plan when they make the switch to LTE, says Verizon Communications CFO Fran Shammo.
Speaking at the 40th J.P. Morgan Technology, Media and Telecom conference, Shammo said that as customers migrate to 4G LTE they will no longer be able to keep the $30/month unlimited plan and will have to purchase the company's data-share plan (which has yet to launch).
"Everyone will be on data share," Shammo said. "A lot of our 3G base is on unlimited," he said. "When they migrate off 3G they will have to go to data share. That is beneficial to us."
With the launch of the new data share plan, Shammo says that Verizon will move to a "revenue per account" metric to more accurately measure the company's business.
The next generation iPhone is widely expected to support LTE. This means that many Verizon iPhone customers looking to upgrade to the new device will lose their unlimited data plan.
I don't have a problem with it, after all, 4G is a lot more data hungry than 3G. But what I AM likely to get upset with if Verizon's plans to charge EVERYONE an "upgrade fee", and the fact they won't announce what they're planning to charge until the new iPhones come out.
4G can handle the bandwidth. That is the biggest advantage of 4G. The increased speed is just a nice extra. There is no legitimate explanation for this decision. It is simply a money grab.
I'm Shocked! Shocked, I tell you! Shocked! If Verizon had announced this in the beginning, I suspect that many of their current unlimited customers would have gone with the tired plans initially. The major benefit of the unlimited plan is use with LTE, which will really ramp up the data usage.