Has Verizon's service suddenly degraded for you?

[olbriar]

I'm paying basically $220 for four lines unlimited.

 

[Milo Williamson]

The bad thing is this, my visual voicemail it does not allow it to pop up as much these days... I am assuming that everyone is just haunted.

 

[The_Chief]

TL-DR - Verizon admits its cellular service, which was once "good to excellent" in our area, is now "fair to poor", with no decrease in prices. We moved to a different MVNO provider and cut our bill nearly in half.

*****
On behalf of our entire community, I filed a trouble ticket on March 16, complaining of reduced service and dead zones throughout the area. Every time I supplied additional information, a new rep took over and wanted me to provide all the previous information AGAIN. More often than not, I got the message: "Need more info". Nothing specific. By March 21 I refused to regurgitate the same information over and over, saying I had no more information to provide. The response? "Need more info". To which I began replying, "Me too. Need more info".

It became nothing more than a cat & mouse stall tactic by Verizon... but I learned from one message that area service, which was "good to excellent" just a few years ago, has been degraded significantly:

"...I can see that you are in an area that is considered fair to poor coverage. That does mean that service can vary from day to day. There are always changes that impact our Network, some are controllable and others may not be and we do our best ot offer solutions, like for example wifi and wifi calling to enhance the experience."

Thanks, Verizon, for "enhancing" your lousy cell service with Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi calling, which our PHONES do with no help from Verizon, on our personal Wi-Fi that we pay for from a whole other company!

I identified an MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator) that works with all providers' towers to find the best coverage for each individual customer. They even share our values! Pay for your own stadiums, VZW... we're out. Needless to say, I closed the ticket in disgust this morning. This afternoon, our new provider's SIMs arrived. I couldn't move our numbers off Verizon fast enough.

(EDIT: we have had stellar service and connectivity ever since we ported over, and we're saving a young fortune)

IMPORTANT: If you plan to move your numbers to another provider, call Verizon and make SURE that there are no SIM, port or account locks of any kind... on every number you're moving! Three VZ reps confirmed we had no locks remaining... and the fourth one actually cleared the remaining lock we found still on the account.

Meanwhile - if you're interested in our new company's information, I'll be happy to provide you with the information in a PM but I won't be spammy about it by posting it publicly. Just send me a message and I can give you the information... and you can take advantage of it or not.

 

[nickdalzell]

At work, it's rural country. There was still 1x/3G up until a few weeks ago, and that was the only signal I got there (showing as 'Extended Network' on my Galaxy S5 and, for some odd reason, as 'T-Mobile' on the Galaxy S4 Mini) but since shutting that down, unless I'm on wifi, and using Wifi Calling I have zero service at work, resulting in delayed texts from the boss (like I get reports of freight arriving hours late, or lunch notices an hour late, etc).

I truly wish the carriers would have just left 3G up, until the LTE and 5G coverage could at least replace it first. Heck, there was no problem with them having it all up in the past, so why shut it down and cut people off? It was the same during the AMPS shutdown (again, that nobody asked for or were given any vote in) and today, even in 2023, there are dead zones where AMPS once provided services. They call this an upgrade? reduced coverage? no coverage? don't get me started on the hell that is Digital TV Over-the Air. If you look so much as cross-eyed at a TV today with an antenna, it goes to pixelated garbage. At least, if you're gonna shut stuff down, make sure the replacement is BETTER than what it replaces, not WORSE, or don't bother. Or at least, give the people the ability to say yay or nay. Don't force crap on people. The government is supposed to work by the people, for the people, but it seems to be reversed. things like 'federal mandates' go against everything I was taught in school about how the U.S. Government works. I mean, pretty much all of Schoolhouse Rock is not true today.

I want to go live in the 1950s and never leave. Damn I wish time travel were possible.

 

[The_Chief]

I am very happy with our cell service, now that we've dumped Verizon. Why pay for their retail stores and sports stadiums when they're going to reduce our service but still charge full price? We now have LTE and "5G" all over the place. I didn't believe that whole 5G thing so I did a speed test on my phone. 259 mbps down, 31 up. Well, okay then: that's all the 5G I need!