Verizon's $50/mo. prepaid plan

[Mike in Cincy]

I'm now out of contract and was thinking about getting the above mentioned prepaid plan since I don't have a smartphone. I was told by the Verizon used car salesman...uh, I mean phone salesman that the prepaid service only uses Verizon-owned towers and don't utilize other company's towers, hence limiting coverage.

Is he full of it? It doesn't mention this anywhere on the commercial or website or their fine print.

 

[Haggises]

I would have thought that a regular in-contract Verizon phone only uses Verizon's towers too......

 

[Haggises]

unless they have an agreement to use other companies towers in less populated areas of course...

Ask to see the pre-paid coverage map, see if it differs from the super-duper one.

 

[Mike in Cincy]

I don't think they have a separate map. Which makes me suspicious I was being dooped. Nice avatar btw, new Doctor?

 

[Haggises]

Yes indeed.

 

[Mike in Cincy]

actually the coverage map looks very similar between the two

 

[BubblesTGB]

Yes the prepaid uses Verizon's towers only - no roaming agreements. But also check out Page Plus Cellular. They are a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) for Verizon. They also use Verizon towers but their prepaid is way cheaper. Excellent service, too. My mother actually has an iPhone on their plan and non-smartphones are even less.

 

[tinashubby]

Page plus is just the ticket for me. I have a smart phone that functions as a dumb phone when wifi is not available using page plus. The bill is stupid cheap, and i have never had a dropped call. If I am somewhere that has wifi, and I want smart phone functions enabled on my phone, I just go to its settings and turn on the wifi. Cost for me is $12.00 per month with 250 minutes, and 250 text messages. I can easily add more minutes mid month if I feel I am getting low.

 

[StillShaving]

I am fairly certain Verizon has the best network coverage in the US. That you should not any find a need to roam onto another network. That if Vz is not there, then is a good chance the other big providers are not there either, so it won't matter.

Slightly off topic, but I heard that T-Mobile is gaining customers at expense of other 3 big providers, due in part to offering the iPhone but also because of offering prepaid plans.

 

[jlmiller556]

I am making the move to Boost mobile this weekend.

 

[Slash McCoy]

Verizon? Isn't that outdated CDMA technology, like what the entire rest of the world gave up in favor of the nearly universal GSM technology? You can get the same deal from Tmo or ATT, and $5 less from SimpleMobile. And you can instantly switch phones by simply moving your SIM card. Or instantly go native on a different network by putting a different SIM in your phone, assuming of course that your phone is unlocked. I haven't bought a locked phone in 12 years. I can take my phone almost anywhere and pop a local SIM in, and use it, with the exceptions of Bahamas, Korea, and Japan. GSM is the way to go. YMMV of course. But if you travel at all, you need to go GSM IMHO.

FWIW I am currently paying $2/day for unlimited use, and only paying for the days I use it. If I am out of the country for a month, I will have paid a big fat $0 for my phone use. On a day when I don't make a call (I make maybe 3 phone calls a month on average) and don't need it for internet, I pay... you guessed it, $0. So I probably pay around $200/year for unlimited voice, text, and 2g data. $3/day if I want to go 3g or higher. Go, T-MO!

 

[BubblesTGB]

Actually, most smartphones on Verizon are now on LTE which is actually a form of GSM and uses a swappable SIM card.

A little further clarification, however. GSM was not a follow-up to CDMA. It was a less expensive technology and therefore became more widely adapted worldwide, especially in countries that were lesser developed.

GSM developed out of TDMA (Time Division Multiple Access). CDMA is Code Division Multiple Access and as a result of the cellular packets being divided by code, rather than time, the call quality on CDMA is actually of higher quality.

So Verizon's technology actually works quite well. Just wanted to add that info for the OP. T Mobile has great plans and if it works for you, that's awesome. I have a friend with TMo and they just did the network upgrades for the iPhone in his area. Now he has no service. Go figure.

Cell phones carriers are like razor blades. YMMV

Verizon? Isn't that outdated CDMA technology, like what the entire rest of the world gave up in favor of the nearly universal GSM technology? You can get the same deal from Tmo or ATT, and $5 less from SimpleMobile. And you can instantly switch phones by simply moving your SIM card. Or instantly go native on a different network by putting a different SIM in your phone, assuming of course that your phone is unlocked. I haven't bought a locked phone in 12 years. I can take my phone almost anywhere and pop a local SIM in, and use it, with the exceptions of Bahamas, Korea, and Japan. GSM is the way to go. YMMV of course. But if you travel at all, you need to go GSM IMHO.

FWIW I am currently paying $2/day for unlimited use, and only paying for the days I use it. If I am out of the country for a month, I will have paid a big fat $0 for my phone use. On a day when I don't make a call (I make maybe 3 phone calls a month on average) and don't need it for internet, I pay... you guessed it, $0. So I probably pay around $200/year for unlimited voice, text, and 2g data. $3/day if I want to go 3g or higher. Go, T-MO!

 

[Slash McCoy]

So I can take a Verizon SIM card and stick it in any unlocked GSM phone? Or more importantly, take my Verizon phone, unlock it, go overseas and stick a foreign SIM card in it instead of having to buy another phone because my phone doesn't work on GSM? IOW is Verizon compatible with ordinary GSM?

I heard something about the Verizon iphone having this capability, with the SIM part unlocked right from the store. I thought about buying one, since even with no contract it is cheaper than a regular unlocked iphone from the online apple store, and I would then also have the option of using Verizon if they started doing a better deal then the 3 main GSM carriers, or in an area where Verizon is the only carrier with service.

 

[BubblesTGB]

So I can take a Verizon SIM card and stick it in any unlocked GSM phone? Or more importantly, take my Verizon phone, unlock it, go overseas and stick a foreign SIM card in it instead of having to buy another phone because my phone doesn't work on GSM? IOW is Verizon compatible with ordinary GSM?

I heard something about the Verizon iphone having this capability, with the SIM part unlocked right from the store. I thought about buying one, since even with no contract it is cheaper than a regular unlocked iphone from the online apple store, and I would then also have the option of using Verizon if they started doing a better deal then the 3 main GSM carriers, or in an area where Verizon is the only carrier with service.

The short answer is yes and no. Ha ha.

Part of Verizon's deal with the FCC when they purchased 700mHz spectrum for their LTE network is that they were not allowed to carrier lock the phones. So if you have a Verizon LTE phone, it is unlocked by default. If I put my wife's AT&T SIM card in my Verizon iPhone, it works fine. The only catch is that Verizon and AT&T use different bands for LTE, so the fastest speed I get is AT&T "4G" HSPA+. But it can be done.

Also, with a Verizon LTE phone, you should be able to pop a foreign sim in it when traveling. You cannot however, put a Verizon SIM card in an unlocked gsm phone. That won't work because the Verizon network still does "paging" over CDMA to let the network know when it is placing or receiving a call.

The chances of Verizon ultimately offering a better deal than the other carriers is probably slim. Their attitude is that they are the best, invest the most money in their network, therefore they are a premium brand and demand a premium price. That being said, I have tried all of the carriers (I do some consulting work in the industry) and Verizon always works best for me. But that's just me - different carriers work for different people.

 

[StillShaving]

From what I have read, CDMA requires less handset power and provides more phone channels/connections than TDMA. So in a busy public space there is better chance to get a connection and your phone uses less power when closer to the base station. But that is like saying that BetaMax was better than VHS, it does not matter very much. Compatibility is even more important.

There are lots of standards and evolution of standards when looking at carriers and phones which support 2G/3G/4G. I went shopping for a phone this summer, and also wanted a World capable phone off contract and without carrier lockdown. The number of frequencies used in different places and corresponding 2/3/LTE/4G offerings creates an alphabet soup of specs when trying to phone shop. Even the new Galaxy S4 world phone seemed to have a special variant for Korea 4G. Even though I have no thought of visiting Korea (South or North) anytime soon, it highlighted the issue about 4G. My impression was that finding a world capable 2G/3G phone is pretty easy, but not one that is also 4G/LTE capable as those networks are still rolling out.

 

[OldAF]

Page plus is just the ticket for me. I have a smart phone that functions as a dumb phone when wifi is not available using page plus.

I currently have a dumb phone (3g pay as you go voice /text) with AT&T and have no idea how to go about doing this. Can ANY smart phone be made to function as a dumb phone when wifi is not available?

 

[StillShaving]

I currently have a dumb phone (3g pay as you go voice /text) with AT&T and have no idea how to go about doing this. Can ANY smart phone be made to function as a dumb phone when wifi is not available?

Yes for the most part. All these so called smart phones can function as a regular mobile phone, without any of the extra frills. Meaning you can purchase a plan that only supports talk, or just talk + text, or adds internet to the mix. The specifics depend on what the mobile network provider offers - some restrict certain phones, some only offer bundled plans, etc. So it can get confusing when shopping around. But independent of what plan you purchase from the mobile provider, you can use wifi when available to gain internet access. It is very nice to have a mobile data plan, but it is not necessary.

 

[DesertJake]

T-Mobile got me as a customer thanks to two things... Verizon changing their family plan so it was twice as expensive for me, and T-Mobile now has awesome pricing for a prepaid family plan. The catch is I had to bring my own devices. But there's some pretty decent smartphones now in the $150 range, and I picked up my Nexus 4 for about $250 used. In return for a $100 bill monthly for a family of 4 instead of $200+? I'll take it.

That said, Verizon's network was definitely better. But I can live with the difference.

 

[OldAF]

Yes for the most part. All these so called smart phones can function as a regular mobile phone, without any of the extra frills. Meaning you can purchase a plan that only supports talk, or just talk + text, or adds internet to the mix. The specifics depend on what the mobile network provider offers - some restrict certain phones, some only offer bundled plans, etc. So it can get confusing when shopping around. But independent of what plan you purchase from the mobile provider, you can use wifi when available to gain internet access. It is very nice to have a mobile data plan, but it is not necessary.

Thank you. After looking around a bit it appears Consumer Cellular is a better choice for me. The plans are a bit more flexible and 50 or 100 meg seems much more doable than 10... if you ever need to use 4G at all. Their phones also seemed to be better quality overall.

 

[Jawaburger]

Yes for the most part. All these so called smart phones can function as a regular mobile phone, without any of the extra frills. Meaning you can purchase a plan that only supports talk, or just talk + text, or adds internet to the mix. The specifics depend on what the mobile network provider offers - some restrict certain phones, some only offer bundled plans, etc. So it can get confusing when shopping around. But independent of what plan you purchase from the mobile provider, you can use wifi when available to gain internet access. It is very nice to have a mobile data plan, but it is not necessary.

I know that Verizon will not let you get a smart phone at contract price without paying for a data plan. I assume that if you pay full price for the smart phone, or are out of contract, you can dispense with the data plan. I have to assume that AT&T is the same way; not sure about any other providers.