Verizon changes upgrade policy

Yeah, it's a bummer. I really wish there was someone who had decent signal around me other than them.

Here's the progression of all the value reducing moves they have made :

1. Reduced new every two discount from $100/$50 to $50/$30
2. Got rid of early annual upgrades for primary account holders.
3. Eliminated new every two discounts all together.
4. Switched to tiered data for new customers.
5. Ended grandfathering of unlimited data.
6. Introduced $30 upgrade fee
7. Forced all new customers onto Share Everything Plans.
8. And now changing upgrades from 20 to 24 months.

Kind of depressing really.

I am starting to think about switching more and more. My contract is up soon so I think I am going to have to start looking around.

Not setting the best example for customer retention, eh?

From everything they've been doing it doesn't seem they're too concerned with customer retention. If anything I get the feeling Verizon thinks they're service is so good that customers are not going to want to leave them.

Also, they don't go around advertising the pocket lining anti consumer acts. Therefore the general public doesn't know about them. An article I read days the first people affected will be those whose contact expires on January 1st 2014. All those people are currently already under contract. What I wonder is if changing the scheduled update allowance date counts as a contact change and would thus allow those people to void their contact.

jhawkkw said:

Also, they don't go around advertising the pocket lining anti consumer acts. Therefore the general public doesn't know about them. An article I read days the first people affected will be those whose contact expires on January 1st 2014. All those people are currently already under contract. What I wonder is if changing the scheduled update allowance date counts as a contact change and would thus allow those people to void their contact.

Click to expand...

You may have just found a nice loophole to allow one to exit a contract without having to pay the ETF.

Another thing I found out- if you have a "new every 2" upgrade, better use it this weekend- it expires on April 15th.

Yeah, materially adverse is the magic word. Verizon will fight you tooth and nail for even clear materially adverse changes. It's not going to be easy.

I'm going to, hopefully, clear some things up.

If you have an upgrade BEFORE 9/1/2013, then you are fine. You will be able to upgrade your device on that date or after with no change. If you have upgrade that is AFTER 9/1/2013, then your upgrade date will be pushed back 4 months. All new lines beginning 4/21/2013 will all be put under this new policy, the upgrade has been changed from 20 months to 24. Why they decided to implement this change for new accounts on the 21st, I don't understand. People, like myself, who has an upgrade available after 9/1/2013 will still feel the ill effects of this.

VZW is also changing a current policy where you can use an upgrade for a NON-PHONE to upgrade a PHONE line of service. For instance, you can currently use an upgrade for a tablet you got 2 years ago to get a new phone. Now those upgrades can only be used on similar products (tablet, netbook, MiFi, etc). This also goes into effect on 4/21/2013.

VZW is introducing something with some very strange wording. You will be able to purchase a new smartphone for the subsidized price (presumably early) and have the cost spread out over 12 months. You would be basically paying a higher bill for 12 months while you paid off the rest of the price of the phone, but not extending your contract. This should leave your upgrade in tact. Yes, it is expensive, but it won't require the large investment for a new phone and will instead be spread out.

I did some work on this Friday and drew up a Word document outlining these changes at work so that I could better prepare the people I work for. I assume that this bomb being dropping is going to be a pretty serious call driver across the board. I'm not very happy about my upgrade being pushed back 4 months, I can only assume that other customers will be even more unhappy (and potentially disorderly).

I hope that this information helps.

Im not supporting verizon by any means........and we can all agree that they have done many things which seem to slap their customers in the face

but Im not exactly sure what the uproar is here

I want to make sure Im understanding this correctly..... so please correct me if Im wrong

you signed a contract that says you will use their service for 2 years....... in return as an incentive to do so they gave you a phone at a subsidized price... in many cases free

for a very long time that meant you waited 2 years til the end of your contract and could then in essence do the same thing...... get a new subsidized phone for another 2 years

at some point verizon decided that it was in their best interest..... AND YOURS...... to allow you to go ahead and make that renewal at 20 months instead of 24 months

now they have decided that its no longer in their best interest to do that........ and instead its in their best interest to seek alternative methods...... so they have decided to make you fulfill the contract you voluntarily signed

this is somehow them being greedy bad guys?

as I said...... theres plenty to be disgruntled with verizon about.... but this is clearly not one of those things

all theyre asking you to do is what you agreed to do

copestag said:

Im not supporting verizon by any means........and we can all agree that they have done many things which seem to slap their customers in the face

but Im not exactly sure what the uproar is here

I want to make sure Im understanding this correctly..... so please correct me if Im wrong

you signed a contract that says you will use their service for 2 years....... in return as an incentive to do so they gave you a phone at a subsidized price... in many cases free

for a very long time that meant you waited 2 years til the end of your contract and could then in essence do the same thing...... get a new subsidized phone for another 2 years

at some point verizon decided that it was in their best interest..... AND YOURS...... to allow you to go ahead and make that renewal at 20 months instead of 24 months

now they have decided that its no longer in their best interest to do that........ and instead its in their best interest to seek alternative methods...... so they have decided to make you fulfill the contract you voluntarily signed

this is somehow them being greedy bad guys?

as I said...... theres plenty to be disgruntled with verizon about.... but this is clearly not one of those things

all theyre asking you to do is what you agreed to do

Click to expand...

You make a great point, and I personally would have no problem with Verizon doing this if they had not already done all the things Antimony listed above just in the last couple of years. A person can only take so much before becoming disgruntled. Plus us gnex owners had 2 extra things to be annoyed about.

9. Holding updates hostage while other variants got them quickly.
10. Blocking Google wallet just because they don't want the competition to their isis project getting the upper hand, while their product wasn't even available yet.

Also one Antimony forgot.

11. Attempted to pass a fee of 2 dollars onto the customer for paying your bill by credit card because they didn't want to eat that charge like almost every company does.

#$%@!!! Where did the 1/1/14 date come from,?

Any further (better) explanation of paragraph 3 could substantially ease the pain. Will be really interested to see how that turns out.

Dex said:

I'm going to, hopefully, clear some things up.

If you have an upgrade BEFORE 9/1/2013, then you are fine. You will be able to upgrade your device on that date or after with no change. If you have upgrade that is AFTER 9/1/2013, then your upgrade date will be pushed back 4 months. All new lines beginning 4/21/2013 will all be put under this new policy, the upgrade has been changed from 20 months to 24. Why they decided to implement this change for new accounts on the 21st, I don't understand. People, like myself, who has an upgrade available after 9/1/2013 will still feel the ill effects of this.

VZW is also changing a current policy where you can use an upgrade for a NON-PHONE to upgrade a PHONE line of service. For instance, you can currently use an upgrade for a tablet you got 2 years ago to get a new phone. Now those upgrades can only be used on similar products (tablet, netbook, MiFi, etc). This also goes into effect on 4/21/2013.

VZW is introducing something with some very strange wording. You will be able to purchase a new smartphone for the subsidized price (presumably early) and have the cost spread out over 12 months. You would be basically paying a higher bill for 12 months while you paid off the rest of the price of the phone, but not extending your contract. This should leave your upgrade in tact. Yes, it is expensive, but it won't require the large investment for a new phone and will instead be spread out.

I did some work on this Friday and drew up a Word document outlining these changes at work so that I could better prepare the people I work for. I assume that this bomb being dropping is going to be a pretty serious call driver across the board. I'm not very happy about my upgrade being pushed back 4 months, I can only assume that other customers will be even more unhappy (and potentially disorderly).

I hope that this information helps.

Click to expand...

I wouldn't have a problem with this if it started once you signed a new contract or upgraded an existing one.

My problem is that they have been allowing you to upgrade after 20 months for a while. If they would have said this would be stopped maybe some would have switched carriers before upgrading.

If they didn't want you to know about this then on my Verizon the upgrade date shouldn't show you are eligible at 20 months now for it to be changed.

My thing is just the principle of them being able to change something like that during an existing contract.

Our ghost line contract is up 1-18-14, so that means if I want to upgrade it to keep my unlimited that I will now need to wait until that day and not 9-18-13?

gloriousnumber1 said:

Our ghost line contract is up 1-18-14, so that means if I want to upgrade it to keep my unlimited that I will now need to wait until that day and not 9-18-13?

Click to expand...

Correct. If you upgrade occurs AFTER 9/1/2013, then it will be pushed back 4 months.

DILands said:

#$%@!!! Where did the 1/1/14 date come from,?

Any further (better) explanation of paragraph 3 could substantially ease the pain. Will be really interested to see how that turns out.

Click to expand...

Further explanation of that third paragraph:

You buy a phone on 1/1/2014. You pay 200 dollars for phone. You have 100 per month for your particular service package. On 1/1/2015 You decide you want another phone. You go and pay the 200 dollar subsidized price for said phone. The retail price for the phone is 500 dollars. You will pay out 300 dollars over the next 12 months. 300/12 = 25. You will now pay an addition 25 dollars per month on your bill for the rest of your contract until the phone is paid off. This phone you have purchased has NO EFFECT on your upgrade. On 1/1/16 you can upgrade just like normal. You now own both previous phones and can now pay a subsidized price on a new device as an upgrade along with another two-year contract.

Please let me know if you need a further explanation.

jhawkkw said:

You make a great point, and I personally would have no problem with Verizon doing this if they had not already done all the things Antimony listed above just in the last couple of years. A person can only take so much before becoming disgruntled. Plus us gnex owners had 2 extra things to be annoyed about.

9. Holding updates hostage while other variants got them quickly.
10. Blocking Google wallet just because they don't want the competition to their isis project getting the upper hand, while their product wasn't even available yet.

Also one Antimony forgot.

11. Attempted to pass a fee of 2 dollars onto the customer for paying your bill by credit card because they didn't want to eat that charge like almost every company does.

Click to expand...

This is how I feel too. It's like Verizon is purposely seeing how much they can take from the customers before they start to lose a bunch of people. That's just a messed up way to do business IMO. You should be rewarding loyal customers not trying to see just how much you can prod them before they leave. That's capitalism for you though.

WuBoy said:

This is how I feel too. It's like Verizon is purposely seeing how much they can take from the customers before they start to lose a bunch of people. That's just a messed up way to do business IMO. You should be rewarding loyal customers not trying to see just how much you can prod them before they leave. That's capitalism for you though.

Click to expand...

It's exactly what they are doing and they're banking on their network coverage and 2 year contacts as the glue that traps customers. What really makes it worse is that AT&T doesn't compete with Verizon to try and stabilize the market. Instead they try to one up and follow one another essentially forming an diopoly.

They must still be updating customer records. My account shows upgrade availability of 2/15/14 but my contract expiration date shows 6/15/14...

Doesn't go into effect until 4/21 if I'm not mistaken.

I agree, This change won't get anyone out of an ETF. We agreed to a 2 yr deal, this 20 month upgrade was just yet another perk Verizon is taking away.

I too am stuck using Verizon because the great network. I was with Verizon, got tired of all their changes. Tried t-mobile, straight talk, virgin mobile and page plus for short periods of time. All decent, but just not up to Verizon's standards in terms of reception and call quality.

At&t had better coverage than in the past, but they're not much different than Verizon.

I think T-mobile has changed the future of cell phone service by doing away with signing contracts. Just put a down payment on phone, then pay it off over time, while paying for $$/month service. Then if you want to leave just payoff phone and go.

No where does it state in the customer agreement with VZW anything about upgrade policy per the contract terms.

VZW allowed customers to break their contract without paying an ETF and buy a new phone with another 2 year contract. They changed their policy.

Mayhem said:

They must still be updating customer records. My account shows upgrade availability of 2/15/14 but my contract expiration date shows 6/15/14...

Click to expand...

Same here. I was gonna update my ghost line this fall/winter more than likely to get a subsidized price and keep my unlimited data so I'm off contract. Now, since I can't do that (ghost line contract is up 1-18-14), I will simply dump that one and do the device payment and keep unlimited data that way. The saved money of $13 per month or so will help soften the blow of an extra 30-50 per month so I'm off contract.

NYankee said:

No where does it state in the customer agreement with VZW anything about upgrade policy per the contract terms.

VZW allowed customers to break their contract without paying an ETF and buy a new phone with another 2 year contract. They changed their policy.

Click to expand...

Its true they didn't put it in the contract, but it's also true you went into the contract with one policy, and they change it to another with a real loss in value. Fees are also not included in the contract, but raising them is considered a materially adverse change.

Material adverse change has nothing to do with the upgrade date changing since the upgrade date is nowhere to be found in the contract terms.


Customers are covered if there is a change to their plan in terms of pricing or a change to their customer agreement.


VZW customer agreement is ironclad on this one since nothing is mentioned about a customers upgrade date and never has been mentioned about a customers upgrade date.