Verizon grandfathered unlimited data

[Ken-55]

Well, Verizon didn't kill through unlimited data plans but they did increase them $20/line. I have 3 lines, 2 with the unlimited data and 1 with 2 gb/month. I use one of the unlimited data lines as my personal phone and my wife has the 2 gb line for her phone. The remaining unlimited data line (sim card) either resides in a jetpack for WiFi in the RV or other a USB stick in the home Cradlepoint router in the house for home Internet service. It works OK, but it's not as reliable as cable or DSL wired into the house.

I'm thinking it's time to get cable or DSL for the house and give up the extra unlimited data line. When we travel, I can either activate the hotspot on my phone ($30/month) or put my sim card in the jetpack for WiFi and use my wife's phone for voice.

Even with the $20/month increase, the grandfathered unlimited data is desirable to some people. Does anyone have experience selling the rights to unlimited data lines? They call it assumption of liability, I see auctions on eBay that go for hundreds of dollars but I'm not sure if I want to try?

[NC25T]

yes totally worth dropping unlimited for dsl, cable, u-verse etc.

Possibly combine the phones to the same account, should save you $$$

I am with Verizon and have free hot spot on my phone thus several years ago I cancelled the jet pack.

Sorry zero input on selling the unlimited data card

[dpinvidic]

We used to have unlimited. Yes it made me feel good, but it was basically a waste because we were usually under 6GB for both phones.

When my wife upgraded her phone we had to go with a fixed plan.
Bottom line is it was a lot cheaper.
When i do need more data, i just increase it for the month.
The new plan also lets my phone be a hotspot without any extra charge.

Also like that i am paying monthly for thd new phone, and that goes away when it is paid for.

My monthly bill is now lower than before.

Regards,
Dan

[CountryFit]

Originally Posted by Ken-55

Well, Verizon didn't kill through unlimited data plans but they did increase them $20/line. I have 3 lines, 2 with the unlimited data and 1 with 2 gb/month. I use one of the unlimited data lines as my personal phone and my wife has the 2 gb line for her phone. The remaining unlimited data line (sim card) either resides in a jetpack for WiFi in the RV or other a USB stick in the home Cradlepoint router in the house for home Internet service. It works OK, but it's not as reliable as cable or DSL wired into the house.

I'm thinking it's time to get cable or DSL for the house and give up the extra unlimited data line. When we travel, I can either activate the hotspot on my phone ($30/month) or put my sim card in the jetpack for WiFi and use my wife's phone for voice.

Even with the $20/month increase, the grandfathered unlimited data is desirable to some people. Does anyone have experience selling the rights to unlimited data lines? They call it assumption of liability, I see auctions on eBay that go for hundreds of dollars but I'm not sure if I want to try?

we also have 2 unlimited and one regular phone. i use a unlimited for everything - as a modem/router - online surfing, sling tv, printer... it does whatever a modem in a home does. i use a lot data.

the dw is mostly with me, so she uses a tablet to log in webs thru my phone. the regular phone is just for her carrying when we separate in shopping malls or she goes to lib/bookstores and i go other places.

the other unlimited is being used by our daughter. she doesn't use that much data though.

did you look at foxfi? it suppose work.

foxfi works

[Duner]

If you use your past data usage as an indicator of future usage, beware of the newer, faster phones and network speed.

Not sure if this applies in your case, but 3g phones use a lot less data than the faster 4g phones. Our daughter's Iphone 4 data usage over the years was only about 1/3 gig per month. Since we upgraded to Iphone 6 she's now using 2-3 gig data per month, basically doing the same kind of browsing, navigation, etc.

Also, Verizon has tripled the cost of adding more data, at least on my share everything plan. In the past I'd add 2GB for $10 when I got to 90%, just reply "Yes" to a text for more data from Verizon. Now it is $30 for 2GB.

[anthonynalli]

Assumption of Liability (AOL) is very hit and miss. VZW would love nothing more than to cancel your unlimited and have one less of them out there. Transferring it to someone else is very much dependent on the agent on the line. Some will do it. Most won't for a number of reasons, but boiling down to they don't want to support these accounts sticking around if they don't have to.

Personally, I'd be very interested in an AOL if it can actually happen.

Anthony

[docj]

Originally Posted by Duner

If you use your past data usage as an indicator of future usage, beware of the newer, faster phones and network speed.

Not sure if this applies in your case, but 3g phones use a lot less data than the faster 4g phones. Our daughter's Iphone 4 data usage over the years was only about 1/3 gig per month. Since we upgraded to Iphone 6 she's now using 2-3 gig data per month, basically doing the same kind of browsing, navigation, etc.

The phone uses exactly the same amount of data for the same tasks. What differs is how the browser interacts with the internet. For example, higher resolution video streams are accessed, more files are "pre-fetched", etc. Yes, it may appear to use a lot more data, but if you can control it you will find that the data use for the exact same task is the same.

[Duner]

Originally Posted by docj

The phone uses exactly the same amount of data for the same tasks. What differs is how the browser interacts with the internet. For example, higher resolution video streams are accessed, more files are "pre-fetched", etc. Yes, it may appear to use a lot more data, but if you can control it you will find that the data use for the exact same task is the same.

But to my knowledge in many cases you can't control the amount and rate of the data flow. Maybe the brains on this forum can point us to a "to-do" list to reduce data usage.

Yes we block flash, don't let Facebook pre-load videos, etc, to limit as much as possible. Most of our data is thru the phone as a hotspot to our laptops. Our daughter's usage went up times 6 just from i4 to i6 phone upgrade & no hotspot usage.

But, for example, if you're using Google Maps, satellite view, a 4g network and 4g phone will give you a hi def view rather quickly and then street view loads quick. So if you just want to see the details of a campground, a slow 3g will give you a blurry low res pic of the city and allow you to zoom in on the area around the cg long before the details of the whole city loads. Sure if you wait longer on a low speed network, you will use the exact amt of data for the same info, but typically you can get in and out of a webpage using less data when the speed is slower.

[gemini5362]

Originally Posted by docj

The phone uses exactly the same amount of data for the same tasks. What differs is how the browser interacts with the internet. For example, higher resolution video streams are accessed, more files are "pre-fetched", etc. Yes, it may appear to use a lot more data, but if you can control it you will find that the data use for the exact same task is the same.

Actually the poster was probably correct in what he said. The difference is in the phone. Their is quite a lot of complaints about the Iphone 6 running tasks in the background. For one thing if the speed when you are on a wifi network is slower the 6 automatically switches to using cell phone data. If his daughter had been using wifi for browsing now even in the same areas she might be using cell phone data to browse. Siri has to be online to work so that will increase data usage. Others have pointed out hi res versus low res etc.

[Ken-55]

Originally Posted by anthonynalli

Assumption of Liability (AOL) is very hit and miss. VZW would love nothing more than to cancel your unlimited and have one less of them out there. Transferring it to someone else is very much dependent on the agent on the line. Some will do it. Most won't for a number of reasons, but boiling down to they don't want to support these accounts sticking around if they don't have to.

Personally, I'd be very interested in an AOL if it can actually happen.

Anthony

This seems to be the current thought on making AOL work:

The Facts about AOL and Unlimited Data Plans

I realize that they'd like it if I give up the unlimited data and keep the line, that's just not going to happen. I'll either find someone who wants to make a deal and do the AOL or I'll just cancel the line completely. The former makes sense if I can make a few bucks off it, the latter would give me some satisfaction if you get what I mean??

There's quite a few for sale and completed sales on eBay. I'd just be leery of selling the AOL rights to a stranger and have them disputing the deal after they get the AOL completed or screwing up the AOL and trying to get their money back. May not be worth the hassle. I wonder if I can find someone local, like through Craigslist, and go to a Verizon store together?

[kiwiian]

Hi there,
Ian from New Zealand here. We are arriving Saturday and need to set up one iphone with unlimited data. Like you we use lots.. We will hotspot the second iphone off the first.
Can you tell me who you use, the cost per month and if we can use our own (unlocked) phones?
We have had t_mobile plans before but they run to $95/month for unlimited plus another $10/month for hotspotting.
Regards
Ian

[dpinvidic]

Originally Posted by kiwiian

Hi there,
Ian from New Zealand here. We are arriving Saturday and need to set up one iphone with unlimited data. Like you we use lots.. We will hotspot the second iphone off the first.
Can you tell me who you use, the cost per month and if we can use our own (unlocked) phones?
We have had t_mobile plans before but they run to $95/month for unlimited plus another $10/month for hotspotting.
Regards
Ian

I can at least recommend Verizon because they have the best coverage (least complaints). Unlimited data is pretty expensive if you really don't need it.
Can't help with the other questions.

Dan

[wildtoad]

Originally Posted by gemini5362

Actually the poster was probably correct in what he said. The difference is in the phone. Their is quite a lot of complaints about the Iphone 6 running tasks in the background. For one thing if the speed when you are on a wifi network is slower the 6 automatically switches to using cell phone data. If his daughter had been using wifi for browsing now even in the same areas she might be using cell phone data to browse. Siri has to be online to work so that will increase data usage. Others have pointed out hi res versus low res etc.

The jump to cell data from slow wifi can be turned off in settings.

[NINK]

I recently acquired a Verizon unlimited data through and assumption of liability from from Jason at 415-830-4850. A friend of mine did the same a couple of months back. Jason does this as a business and is very professional. There is a significant up front cost, but then your monthly data costs will probably be lower than they are now. I calculated that the time to breakeven for me was about 9.5 months. It's well worth talking to him if you are a heavy data user and plan to be needing it for a while.

It took only about 1 hour on the phone with Verizon and Jason, then Jason sent me a sim chip by fed ex and I was up and running a few minutes after I got it.