AT&T 42mb/s Verizon 2 :(

[Applejuiced]

Let me be clear. Yes I was under contract. One year in to be exact. But NO, I did not want another subsidized phone. I wanted to buy the 6s outright. I wanted to pay off my current phone, and buy a new one at full price. They said that was impossible. The guy SCREAMED at me over and over, I stopped counting after he said it the 7th time "the only way you can get a 6s is to cancel service." Then he transferred me to the cancellation department where the entire argument started all over again with some poor girl. After 15 minutes she just finally agreed with him and said the only way I could get a 6s was to completely cancel.

Here's the fun part, in my next post, I'm going to explain exactly how you CAN pay off a phone early with AT&T and upgrade. It's actually really easy. I discovered this yesterday.

You're confused still I see.
When you get a 2 year subsidy there's nothing to pay off on the current phone. It's yours, you just stay with the company for 2 years.
You can just purchase a new one full price any time you want. You can go to apple or any retailer and pay full price for a new iPhone.
I agree that no customer rep should scream towards you but you don't have to sit there and argue with a bad rep.
Hang up. That's all.

 

[Moki808]

The first thing that was bothering me - they wouldn't let me switch from my 7gb plan to the new 15gb plan because I wasn't a Next customer. All four of my phones were on two year contracts.

But the fight happened when I called them to see how I could upgrade from the 6 to the 6s. They said I could not. Ever. No matter what. I asked them if I paid off the phone could I upgrade then? They said I could not under any circumstances pay off the phone. Finally, they told me the only way I could get the 6s was to cancel my service and pay an ETF fee. By that time most of the screaming was over and I was more than happy to pay an ETF fee and walk. So the guy who went ballistic on me transferred me to a lady to cancel my service. She told me if I canceled service my number would be gone for all eternity. I was like - fine just get me out of here. Then she said if I canceled there would be a $215 fee, I was like - dang that's cheap, let's cancel. Then she told me if she canceled my phone would die the moment I hung up. I was like whatever. So she canceled my number and I went for nearly a month without a phone.

As of right now I'm VERY happy with my 18gb of Verizon data for less money. And this time I bought my phone outright so no one could tell me what to do again, haha! But hopefully Verizon's LTE speed is perkier outside of my house. We'll see.

Interesting. I had the reverse happen. Been with Verizon for more than five years. They told me I could not upgrade, etc, etc. But I was not about to lose my Hawaii phone number so I am porting it over to AT&T and then will pay the ETF to Verizon and be done with them.

 

[ohsnaphappy]

You're confused still I see.
When you get a 2 year subsidy there's nothing to pay off on the current phone. It's yours, you just stay with the company for 2 years.
You can just purchase a new one full price any time you want. You can go to apple or any retailer and pay full price for a new iPhone.
I agree that no customer rep should scream towards you but you don't have to sit there and argue with a bad rep.
Hang up. That's all.

It may be yours. That's fine. But it's not unlocked until you pay off the phone via the ETF. Because when you buy a subsidized phone, you haven't paid for all of it. Each month you pay it off a little more, meaning each month your ETF will be a little less.

So you can't sell it as unlocked phone until you pay it off and get it unlocked. You can't swap sims until you pay it off and get it unlocked. And you can't switch carriers until you pay it off and get it unlocked.

So my wife's phone, which was subsidized and under contract with AT&T, has been paid off via an ETF, unlocked, now has a Verizon sim in it, and her number was ported from AT&T to Verizon. Perfect.

 

[ohsnaphappy]

Interesting. I had the reverse happen. Been with Verizon for more than five years. They told me I could not upgrade, etc, etc. But I was not about to lose my Hawaii phone number so I am porting it over to AT&T and then will pay the ETF to Verizon and be done with them.

This was definitely ignorance on my part. I didn't know what porting was. AT&T was not about to tell me "hey friend, you can port your number to Verizon" haha. So I lost my number. After I opened my account with Verizon, they told me they could port my wife and my daughter's number. Verizon did not however, explain how I could get my AT&T phones unlocked and bring them over to Verizon. I had to figure that out on my own. Verizon wanted me to buy new phones for my family. Thankfully I figured out a way to get AT&T to unlock their phones even though they were still under contract.

Edit: But you may not need to leave Verzion unless you want to. Totally fine if you do. But maybe you can do what I'm suggesting, pay your ETF, unlock your Verizon phone, then put the Sim in your new phone, and sell your old unlocked phone. All without ever leaving Verizon.

 

[Applejuiced]

It may be yours. That's fine. But it's not unlocked until you pay off the phone via the ETF. Because when you buy a subsidized phone, you haven't paid for all of it. Each month you pay it off a little more, meaning each month your ETF will be a little less.

So you can't sell it as unlocked phone until you pay it off and get it unlocked. You can't swap sims until you pay it off and get it unlocked. And you can't switch carriers until you pay it off and get it unlocked.

So my wife's phone, which was subsidized and under contract with AT&T, has been paid off via an ETF, unlocked, now has a Verizon sim in it, and her number was ported from AT&T to Verizon. Perfect.

Obviously like I said they only unlock it once the contract is up or pay the etf.
Very simple things that everyone knows for years now. No wonder the Att rep was screaming at you

 

[D.T.]

Whoever said they both stink, well yeah

The better of the two really does depend on your area, we switched from AT&T to Verizon about 3 years ago, I found that V was better (though still not great) vs. ATT at the homestead/home office. Drive a few miles off the island, and the reception is good-to-excellent, the LTE speeds hit 65Mbps+ (and in all my occasional travel spots: Jax, DC, SF). V + iPhone now even supports concurrent voice and data (when LTE is available).

That being said, while V has improved, I've found is 95% of my communication (personal and business) has migrated to network based service: FT or FTA, Skype, Hangouts - I leave my phone on WiFi, it almost never uses cellular here (unless there's an internet outage).

OP: is your poor reception around the house? Office? If it's an option, just go WiFi.

My round about point: in major areas, they're both solid (it's a coin toss), with WiFi in my so-so reception area cell is mostly irrelevant.

 

[iNinja08]

Well, 2mbps on verizon, that's a first. In my area vz is the undisputed champ. You can check http://opensignal.com/ to see if your speed is "normal" for your area. If you click the advanced view it'll show you avg speeds based on your map selection.

 

[Newtons Apple]

There's bad customer service reps on every company.
There's no point in arguing and fighting or even canceling to prove a point to that one ignorant employee. They don't care if you leave or stay.
Hang up and call again and ask to be transferred to a supervisor or manager. Have them explain you your options. If you're in a contract obviously you can't get another subsidized device whenever you want.
Paying hundreds of dollars, losing a phone number that you might have had for a long time and switching to a carrier with worst service in your area is not the rational thing to do because one of their employees pissed you off.

This.

I learned long ago that no matter how upset you get, the carrier could care less. They had the OP under a two year contract and there was little advantage for them to get them out of your current phone. There is little you can do to shock these people as they have heard it all many times.

There are times to fight and other times it is best to move on.

 

[dancefreak]

Still unclear why you couldn't switch to a Next plan to get a new phone. Seems there must be something left out of this story or maybe you were very rude to the agent or didn't clearly explain what you wanted so they weren't too keen on helping. I called retention directly and said very calmly I have a year left on my contract but seeing I can get a new phone from t-mobile and they'll pay my fee if I switch, are there options to stay with ATT and upgrade my phone? She said let me check your account and then said I could either pay full price or get a device on a Next plan. I opted for Next. Everyone wins. Told a few friends who did this as well with no questions asked. From my limited experience it seems to be policy rather than a special exception to let people leave subsidized plans early if you go to Next. The agent I spoke with couldn't have been more friendly, helpful and pleasant.

 

[alent1234]

Still unclear why you couldn't switch to a Next plan to get a new phone. Seems there must be something left out of this story or maybe you were very rude to the agent or didn't clearly explain what you wanted so they weren't too keen on helping. I called retention directly and said very calmly I have a year left on my contract but seeing I can get a new phone from t-mobile and they'll pay my fee if I switch, are there options to stay with ATT and upgrade my phone? She said let me check your account and then said I could either pay full price or get a device on a Next plan. I opted for Next. Everyone wins. Told a few friends who did this as well with no questions asked. From my limited experience it seems to be policy rather than a special exception to let people leave subsidized plans early if you go to Next. The agent I spoke with couldn't have been more friendly, helpful and pleasant.

going to NEXT they will even lower your bill

 

[alent1234]

The first thing that was bothering me - they wouldn't let me switch from my 7gb plan to the new 15gb plan because I wasn't a Next customer. All four of my phones were on two year contracts.

But the fight happened when I called them to see how I could upgrade from the 6 to the 6s. They said I could not. Ever. No matter what. I asked them if I paid off the phone could I upgrade then? They said I could not under any circumstances pay off the phone. Finally, they told me the only way I could get the 6s was to cancel my service and pay an ETF fee. By that time most of the screaming was over and I was more than happy to pay an ETF fee and walk. So the guy who went ballistic on me transferred me to a lady to cancel my service. She told me if I canceled service my number would be gone for all eternity. I was like - fine just get me out of here. Then she said if I canceled there would be a $215 fee, I was like - dang that's cheap, let's cancel. Then she told me if she canceled my phone would die the moment I hung up. I was like whatever. So she canceled my number and I went for nearly a month without a phone.

As of right now I'm VERY happy with my 18gb of Verizon data for less money. And this time I bought my phone outright so no one could tell me what to do again, haha! But hopefully Verizon's LTE speed is perkier outside of my house. We'll see.

until they start giving pay in full discounts, there is no reason to pay in full unless you need an unlocked device

 

[dancefreak]

going to NEXT they will even lower your bill

That depends. If you're on a mobile share plan, yes you'll save $25 on device access which really makes it a no brainer. If you're on an old family talk plan with unlimited data, the price remains the same.

 

[AbSoluTc]

Still unclear why you couldn't switch to a Next plan to get a new phone. Seems there must be something left out of this story or maybe you were very rude to the agent or didn't clearly explain what you wanted so they weren't too keen on helping. I called retention directly and said very calmly I have a year left on my contract but seeing I can get a new phone from t-mobile and they'll pay my fee if I switch, are there options to stay with ATT and upgrade my phone? She said let me check your account and then said I could either pay full price or get a device on a Next plan. I opted for Next. Everyone wins. Told a few friends who did this as well with no questions asked. From my limited experience it seems to be policy rather than a special exception to let people leave subsidized plans early if you go to Next. The agent I spoke with couldn't have been more friendly, helpful and pleasant.

I agree with dancefreak - I don't think we have the whole story here. You don't pay off a phone on contract. You pay an ETF. If you're on NEXT, you pay off the phone if you want to leave early.

Been with AT&T for 7 years and this has been my experience. Great customer services and never had an issue. Had Verizon before that and they have the WORST customer services in my experience.