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Cheaper to buy subsidized and pay ETF than buy full price?
- Thread starter skimcpip
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You guys sure?
This is from the Verizon customer agreement:
This is from the Verizon customer agreement:
What Happens if My Postpay Service Is Canceled Before the End of My Contract Term?
If you're signing up for Postpay Service, you're agreeing to subscribe to a line of Service either on a monthtomonth basis or for a minimum contract term, as shown on your receipt or order confirmation. (If your Service is suspended without billing, that time doesn't count toward completing your contract term.) Once you've completed your contract term, you'll automatically become a customer on a monthtomonth basis for that line of Service. If you cancel a line of Service, or if we cancel it for good cause, during its contract term, you'll have to pay an early termination fee. If your contract term results from your purchase of an advanced device, your early termination fee will be $350 minus $10 for each full month of your contract term that you complete. Otherwise, your early termination fee will be $175 minus $5 for each full month of your contract term that you complete. Cancellations will become effective on the last day of that month's billing cycle, and you are responsible for all charges incurred until then. Also, if you bought your wireless device from an authorized agent or thirdparty vendor, you should check whether they charge a separate termination fee.
If you're signing up for Postpay Service, you're agreeing to subscribe to a line of Service either on a monthtomonth basis or for a minimum contract term, as shown on your receipt or order confirmation. (If your Service is suspended without billing, that time doesn't count toward completing your contract term.) Once you've completed your contract term, you'll automatically become a customer on a monthtomonth basis for that line of Service. If you cancel a line of Service, or if we cancel it for good cause, during its contract term, you'll have to pay an early termination fee. If your contract term results from your purchase of an advanced device, your early termination fee will be $350 minus $10 for each full month of your contract term that you complete. Otherwise, your early termination fee will be $175 minus $5 for each full month of your contract term that you complete. Cancellations will become effective on the last day of that month's billing cycle, and you are responsible for all charges incurred until then. Also, if you bought your wireless device from an authorized agent or thirdparty vendor, you should check whether they charge a separate termination fee.
So add another $40 then if it's another line on a share everything plan? Still $60 cheaper.
I was playing around on Verizon's site yesterday and they make you pay for your first month pro-rated and the following months bill too so that first bill is actually quite high. So no, its not a better deal.
For me i'd rather pay a couple more bucks and avoid the hassle of paying the extra month and a potential problem on my phone bill.
I do this for all of my iPhones on a yearly basis (as I use a cheap pay-as-you-go nanoSIM card from Spot Mobile), and last year... when I was buying the 5, I called up AT&T, Verizon and Sprint. AT&T and Sprint both said it's mandatory to pay the first month... which shoots past the $649+tax unlocked price (however much your sales tax would be, the subsidized and ETFed price was still substantially higher than the full price). For Verizon though, their customer support staff said that you pay for what you use. I ended up buying the Verizon iPhone 5 (which is good for its already-unlocked phase), but you still need to activate the phone line and then you are charged a per-day pro-rated basis. So... even if you just activate it to terminate it (it being your contract), you'll still pay the first-day fee (something around $20), the activation fee with tax, the ETF with tax, and in total for my 16 GB, it turned out to be:
iPhone | $200
Tax | +$60
Day | +$20
Activation | +$50
ETF | +$350
Tax | + $30
Gov/State/City Fees | +$20
**
All rounded figures, but the total above is... $730.
However, if you buy the newly-available T-Mobile version, you can spend $650+Tax... which for me would be $60, or $710.
Sure... buying unlocked at $710 is only $20 less expensive than buying the cheapest contract-wise option after ETF (Verizon) at $730, but think of all the priceless time you'll spend calling the Verizon customer service multiple times like I did just to cancel the service and pay the ETF and all that... the processes of registering online and then making a payment through their portal... and waiting on the hold-line. All that energy and productivity you could have spent elsewhere as I've come to learn the hard way.
$20 more AND several hours of your time... versus buying unlocked up-front and no hassles. Pretty clear winner.
This time, after 4 years of buying iPhones, I will get to do the latter from the very first day thanks to the T-Mobile iPhone. And since all iPhone 5Ses have the same cellular bandlines (other than the few bits of additional spectrums on the Sprint 5S that aren't extremely critical to have), it doesn't really matter which one you get.
Hope that helps since I have experience with this exact circumstance annually.
iPhone | $200
Tax | +$60
Day | +$20
Activation | +$50
ETF | +$350
Tax | + $30
Gov/State/City Fees | +$20
**
All rounded figures, but the total above is... $730.
However, if you buy the newly-available T-Mobile version, you can spend $650+Tax... which for me would be $60, or $710.
Sure... buying unlocked at $710 is only $20 less expensive than buying the cheapest contract-wise option after ETF (Verizon) at $730, but think of all the priceless time you'll spend calling the Verizon customer service multiple times like I did just to cancel the service and pay the ETF and all that... the processes of registering online and then making a payment through their portal... and waiting on the hold-line. All that energy and productivity you could have spent elsewhere as I've come to learn the hard way.
$20 more AND several hours of your time... versus buying unlocked up-front and no hassles. Pretty clear winner.
This time, after 4 years of buying iPhones, I will get to do the latter from the very first day thanks to the T-Mobile iPhone. And since all iPhone 5Ses have the same cellular bandlines (other than the few bits of additional spectrums on the Sprint 5S that aren't extremely critical to have), it doesn't really matter which one you get.
Hope that helps since I have experience with this exact circumstance annually.
If you can afford to buy an off-contract iPhone annually, then why concern yourself with saving a few bucks?
I did this last year for my iPhone 5. Ended up getting it for around $540 which is much cheaper than $690 unlocked but it was still a lot of loopholes I had to jump through. I used a friend's family plan add a line so I would avoid paying the full $40 voice for a single line. Here is the breakdown of the costs. This year I'm sure it'll be much harder to get some of the fees waived
iPhone 5 subsidized + tax: $212
Waived activation fee by calling in: $0
1.5 months worth of service (I instantly switched to dumbphone and canceled data): $15
ETF: $315 (with tax it was $375 but I managed to call and get it reduced to no tax)
iPhone 5 subsidized + tax: $212
Waived activation fee by calling in: $0
1.5 months worth of service (I instantly switched to dumbphone and canceled data): $15
ETF: $315 (with tax it was $375 but I managed to call and get it reduced to no tax)
A pleasure. Glad to be of help.
You never know. There are loopholes to everything. It's just a matter of finding a way to discover them. Of course they've thought about this main scenario in-hand, but sometimes, you can do something like adding a line on a family plan and avoid paying entireties.
I am interested in what you mean by 'getting out of the fee.' I can only imagine calling in and begging them not to charge the ETF? Does that sort of thing actually work?!
You, my good sir, are pretty amazing with your trick of ambiguity. I don't have a friend who's on a family plan to add a line, but if I did, I'd do just the same. However, all the call-ins you did that had them wave the fees... how does that all work? They certainly need to follow their set of rules... so they can't just put in requests for refunds simply because one doesn't want to pay the tax, right?
Why wouldn't you want to save yourself the energy and the money if you could? It's only common sense. Besides, I am an app developer who freelances and doesn't have the funds to pay carriers over $1,000 on a yearly basis, so it only makes sense to for me to lose only a coupe hundred dollars per year (when selling the current-gen iPhone for ~$500 the year after, before the new one's keynote) rather than all that money that goes to the service bills.