Travel Technology - The Major 3 wireless carriers going unlimited. What is the best way to benefit?

Stuff is happening in the wireless industry. Verizon's move today has made a ripple in the industry and caused ATT and Tmobile to announce their own unlimited plan.

What do you think will be the best way to benefit from this?

Stuff is happening in the wireless industry. Verizon's move today has made a ripple in the industry and caused ATT and Tmobile to announce their own unlimited plan.

What do you think will be the best way to benefit from this?

Tough call. Go for the carrier that meets your needs. Looks like they are all charging extra for data. Verizon and AT&T both have 3G data, T-Mobile's base plan includes unlimited voice and texts. Verizon and AT&T obviously have a much larger footprint (Verizon in their premium plan includes VZ Navigator GPS navigation on the phone if your phone has GPS).


Verizon $99 + $39 for unlimited text, data, navigation
T-Mobile $99 + $20 for unlimited data (their base plan includes unlimited text)
AT&T $99 + $35 for unlimited text and data (probably higher for Smartphones or iPhones)

What do you think will be the best way to benefit from this?

By not buying it. Unless you use > 5GB of data monthly or you talk for thousands of minutes per month these new plans aren't all that useful. But that won't stop the carriers from pushing the plans on folks who think they use more than they really do.

Oh, and if you have a family plan you're in terrible shape, at least on VZW, as they are charging the $100 per person.

Sprint has had a $99 unlimited plan for years. Guess they didn't advertise it well.

We have a VZW family share plan, and would get CLOBBERED if we switch to this new "deal."

What do you think will be the best way to benefit from this?Uhh... you switch to the unlimited plan if it turns out to be cheaper, duh?

:p

Sprint is down to 60 dollars.

They need to come up with an add-on feature for family plans so that you can up some phones and not others. We carry my father-in-law on our family plan. He goes through a whopping ten minutes a month.

They need to come up with an add-on feature for family plans so that you can up some phones and not others. We carry my father-in-law on our family plan. He goes through a whopping ten minutes a month.Someone who uses so few minutes should be on a prepaid plan. That's about the average of my parents' usage and I've set them up with Virgin Mobile USA where they pay ~$5/month for service.

Sprint is down to 60 dollars.

Do you have a sprint url? Thanks

Just pm me.

Just pm me.

Thanks

I recognize that the $10 that I spend on my father-in-law's phone might not be a great deal, but he has lost his minutes staying on top (or not staying on top) of the recharge cycle. Add to that the fact that he lives on the Canadian border and does cross on occasion and that is another issue. I know that TMobile prepaids now roam in Canada, but they didn't happen.

For the $120 a year the thing costs me, I get the good son-in-law of the year award, and for me that is worth something as well.

Rogers has unlimited plan too.

I looked on Rogers website and couldn't find it, but I couldn't pull up the business section of their wireless products. The site insisted that I pick my city but listed no cities in either Ontario or British Columbia. I knew that Canada was relatively unpopulated, but....

By not buying it. Unless you use > 5GB of data monthly or you talk for thousands of minutes per month these new plans aren't all that useful. But that won't stop the carriers from pushing the plans on folks who think they use more than they really do.

Oh, and if you have a family plan you're in terrible shape, at least on VZW, as they are charging the $100 per person.

I think I am moving my wife to this plan. She is the only person I know of who has actually gone over minutes on 5000 min plan with unlimited nights and weekends.

Your wife looks to be using her phone just as much as my wife- I had to get her her own plan as there was no family plan that made sense for us!

Your wife looks to be using her phone just as much as my wife- I had to get her her own plan as there was no family plan that made sense for us!

I have actually considered having the phone surgically attached to her ear. :D It is a bit scary when the itemized T-Mobile bill has to come with extra postage. They offered her $10/month off just to go to the paperless bill.

Tmobile is the best.

Tmobile is the best.

no, AT&T is better.

I called Tmobile and was told that to get the unlimited plan I will have to sign up for 24 months. I'm not doing that I'm only on a one year contract right now.

Verizon $99 + $39 for unlimited text, data, navigation
T-Mobile $99 + $20 for unlimited data (their base plan includes unlimited text)
AT&T $99 + $35 for unlimited text and data (probably higher for Smartphones or iPhones)

I think the AT&T one might actually be lower for smartphones and iphones. I can't see how they can up the iphone data plan above 20$, and the smarthphone plan has always been cheaper than the pda plan.

that said, I called at&t to find out what I could do for the iphone plan I have 39.99$ for 500 minutes, plus 20$ for unlimited data, and the upped the minutes to 650, and put 3000 in my roll-over minutes for free. I don't use anywhere NEAR that much on the iphone, but nice to have NTL

With Verizon, if you currently receive a corporate employee discount, this WILL NOT apply to the unlimited plan.

I was nosing around the ATT site, looking at their plans and noticed another change that is not for the better.

I'm currently on a pre-Cingular ATTWS plan. I'm happy with it, although every time I visit the ATT store I'm offered an employee's first-born child to upgrade and, by the way, sign a 2 year contract.

I currently have an unlimited data plan on one of my lines. It's handy for doing email on my Treo, and I can swap the sim into my Aircard and use the EDGE/3G network that way too. The cost of that plan add-on is $45.

Now there is no mention under the current plans -- that I can find anyway -- of any unlimited data plan, and the nearest to it is a 5GB plan for $60!

I don't think I'll be upgrading, but instead have stocked up on old blue ATTWS sim cards.

If I'm wrong, I'd be delighted to be shown :)

I was nosing around the ATT site, looking at their plans and noticed another change that is not for the better.

I'm currently on a pre-Cingular ATTWS plan. I'm happy with it, although every time I visit the ATT store I'm offered an employee's first-born child to upgrade and, by the way, sign a 2 year contract.

I currently have an unlimited data plan on one of my lines. It's handy for doing email on my Treo, and I can swap the sim into my Aircard and use the EDGE/3G network that way too. The cost of that plan add-on is $45.

Now there is no mention under the current plans -- that I can find anyway -- of any unlimited data plan, and the nearest to it is a 5GB plan for $60!

I don't think I'll be upgrading, but instead have stocked up on old blue ATTWS sim cards.

If I'm wrong, I'd be delighted to be shown :)

It may be time to consider a different provider.

Link for at&t deal
http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/cell-phone-plans/index.jsp

Link for at&t deal
http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/cell-phone-plans/index.jsp

:confused:

Where is the deal? All I see there are the normal ATT plans?

there is certainly room to negotiate, especially for legacy customers. I moved one line to an iphone plan, which were pretty SET IN STONE. Since I had a great plan, 39.99$ for 1K minutes, N&W 18:00, M2M, I didn't want to give up too much. I ended up with same money, 39.99$ for 900 minutes, 3K in the roll-over bank and 20$ unlimited data. (which is the standard iphone data plan)

I THEN added a 9.99$ second line, to the same plan!

Now there is no mention under the current plans -- that I can find anyway -- of any unlimited data plan, and the nearest to it is a 5GB plan for $60!

I don't think I'll be upgrading, but instead have stocked up on old blue ATTWS sim cards.

If I'm wrong, I'd be delighted to be shown :)

This link (http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/services/serviceDetails.jsp?skuId=sku1160047&catId=) should go to the PDA Unlimited plan that is a $30 add-on to any voice plan.Unlimited data usage for PDAs and Smartphones

There is a similar plan (http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/services/serviceDetails.jsp?skuId=sku1160046&catId=) for BlackBerry devices.

The 5GB/$60 plans also include tethering your computer to the device as a modem. My guess is that if you just move the SIM to the AirCard it would work just fine, though I'm not positive.

S.

ps- Happy 5000th post to me!

It may be time to consider a different provider.

Your recommendations?

I need a family plan with lines for 3 people.

I don't want to give up my unlocked GSM Treo. One of the family members is very, very loathe to have to learn a new phone and is happy with current recent-model Samsung flip phone. Third one can be persuaded but would also prefer to keep current GSM phone.

As noted, I also have an unlimited data add-on plan for $45 on my phone's line. As I said, I can use its sim on either my phone for Treo-webbing/emailing or in my aircard in my laptop. I would want to continue to be able to do both. I don't want to have to worry about tracking my number of data bytes.

I do not want a Windows mobile phone....

there is certainly room to negotiate, especially for legacy customers.

If you have a negotiating strategy to suggest in my situation (and I have been a long-time customer dating back to being a Cellular One customer in the midwest before it was bought out in the Jurassic era by ATTWS)

This link (http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/services/serviceDetails.jsp?skuId=sku1160047&catId=) should go to the PDA Unlimited plan that is a $30 add-on to any voice plan.

There is a similar plan (http://www.wireless.att.com/cell-phone-service/services/serviceDetails.jsp?skuId=sku1160046&catId=) for BlackBerry devices.

The 5GB/$60 plans also include tethering your computer to the device as a modem. My guess is that if you just move the SIM to the AirCard it would work just fine, though I'm not positive.

I'm not positive either, and I'd hate to "experiment" with two years at stake.