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OMG. Fuck Verizon, Too!
Apr. 1st, 2022 10:07 amThe past few days I've been detailing our runarounds with trying to get our home internet service with T-Mobile fixed. I've summarized the situation with two words: Fuck T-Mobile. Well, now I've got to say Fuck Verizon, Too!
The latest chapter in our T-Mobile runaround, yesterday evening, left us with a promise they'd ship a new device Friday via same-day delivery. But it won't arrive until Friday evening at the earliest— and even then only if T-Mobile was being honest and accurate in their promise, which I absolutely do not trust right now. That leaves me with at least one more day of having to use my mobile phone (Verizon network) as a mobile hotspot for working remotely. And the problem there is that we're just about out of data for this billing cycle... which, btw, began just 4 days ago.
Over a late supper Thursday night after leaving the T-Mobile store with only a hard-to-believe promise in hand Hawk and I weighed our options for the immediate future. I'd still need a solution for Friday, at an absolute minimum. Once I hit the monthly bandwidth cap I'd be limited to very slow service, much too slow for remote work. How much to buy additional one-time data? Verizon offers 1GB for $15. That's... ridiculous. I consume easily 3GB per day working remotely, and that's even while limiting my work, e.g. by turning off my camera during video calls. There's no way I'm paying an extra $45++ per day to Verizon while waiting for T-Mobile.
Okay, so how about upgrading our Verizon service to an unlimited data plan? We studied that option, too. In the past it looked like it would be an upsell of about $65 for both of us. ...$65 more than the $120-ish per month we're already paying. But now the upsell is just half that, an increase of only about $32/mo.
We debated whether or not to buy up to the unlimited plan. I didn't like paying hundreds more per year for an unlimited plan when we rarely exceed the limits on our existing plan. Hawk pointed out that we'd do mobile hotspots more if we had unlimited data. She needs it occasionally when she has to take a meeting while driving to/from the office. And if/when we resume traveling more frequently we may do it more often, too. So I settled for the upcharge. We'd pay up for unlimited data. We pulled the trigger on that change Thursday night.
"Just restart your phones to sync the new service plan," the Verizon agent instructed us. We did... and mobile hotspot functionality completely fucking disappeared!!
It turns out mobile hotspot is disabled in the basic unlimited data plan. It was there in our cheaper, limited plan; but once we agreed to pay $30/month (plus tax) more it was taken away. To get it back we'd have to pay up another $20+tax per month.
I was livid.
Verizon customer support was closed for the night but I was able to chat with an agent overseas via their app. The agent confirmed that the new plan blocks mobile hotspots and that I'd have to pay more to get that functionality back. I asked him to return me to my old plan. He looked into that... or spent 15 minutes pretending to... and said it was not possible. But he did offer to "notate" my account to request a discount of of the $20 upcharge after one month if I bought the more expensive plan. Finding myself with no other option that maintains my ability to work and live in the 21st century for the immediate future, I accepted it.
That call took at least an hour, btw.
Oh, and then one final kick in the pants. The new plan with mobile hotspot functionality wouldn't take effect until sometime after midnight. That's because the agent was in a timezone (almost certainly India) where it was already midday on Friday. He dated the service initiation to Friday. That left us with zero home internet at all for the remainder of Thursday night.
Update: the service did not begin promptly at midnight or even by 12:30am, when we went to bed. It was active by 6:30am Friday though. Yay for one tiny success at the end of a long string of time consuming, money consuming failures. 🤬
The latest chapter in our T-Mobile runaround, yesterday evening, left us with a promise they'd ship a new device Friday via same-day delivery. But it won't arrive until Friday evening at the earliest— and even then only if T-Mobile was being honest and accurate in their promise, which I absolutely do not trust right now. That leaves me with at least one more day of having to use my mobile phone (Verizon network) as a mobile hotspot for working remotely. And the problem there is that we're just about out of data for this billing cycle... which, btw, began just 4 days ago.
Over a late supper Thursday night after leaving the T-Mobile store with only a hard-to-believe promise in hand Hawk and I weighed our options for the immediate future. I'd still need a solution for Friday, at an absolute minimum. Once I hit the monthly bandwidth cap I'd be limited to very slow service, much too slow for remote work. How much to buy additional one-time data? Verizon offers 1GB for $15. That's... ridiculous. I consume easily 3GB per day working remotely, and that's even while limiting my work, e.g. by turning off my camera during video calls. There's no way I'm paying an extra $45++ per day to Verizon while waiting for T-Mobile.
Okay, so how about upgrading our Verizon service to an unlimited data plan? We studied that option, too. In the past it looked like it would be an upsell of about $65 for both of us. ...$65 more than the $120-ish per month we're already paying. But now the upsell is just half that, an increase of only about $32/mo.
We debated whether or not to buy up to the unlimited plan. I didn't like paying hundreds more per year for an unlimited plan when we rarely exceed the limits on our existing plan. Hawk pointed out that we'd do mobile hotspots more if we had unlimited data. She needs it occasionally when she has to take a meeting while driving to/from the office. And if/when we resume traveling more frequently we may do it more often, too. So I settled for the upcharge. We'd pay up for unlimited data. We pulled the trigger on that change Thursday night.
"Just restart your phones to sync the new service plan," the Verizon agent instructed us. We did... and mobile hotspot functionality completely fucking disappeared!!
It turns out mobile hotspot is disabled in the basic unlimited data plan. It was there in our cheaper, limited plan; but once we agreed to pay $30/month (plus tax) more it was taken away. To get it back we'd have to pay up another $20+tax per month.
I was livid.
Verizon customer support was closed for the night but I was able to chat with an agent overseas via their app. The agent confirmed that the new plan blocks mobile hotspots and that I'd have to pay more to get that functionality back. I asked him to return me to my old plan. He looked into that... or spent 15 minutes pretending to... and said it was not possible. But he did offer to "notate" my account to request a discount of of the $20 upcharge after one month if I bought the more expensive plan. Finding myself with no other option that maintains my ability to work and live in the 21st century for the immediate future, I accepted it.
That call took at least an hour, btw.
Oh, and then one final kick in the pants. The new plan with mobile hotspot functionality wouldn't take effect until sometime after midnight. That's because the agent was in a timezone (almost certainly India) where it was already midday on Friday. He dated the service initiation to Friday. That left us with zero home internet at all for the remainder of Thursday night.
Update: the service did not begin promptly at midnight or even by 12:30am, when we went to bed. It was active by 6:30am Friday though. Yay for one tiny success at the end of a long string of time consuming, money consuming failures. 🤬
