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Why we still being charged "smartphone access" $40?

M

mizzou

Diamond Member
It's not 2001 anymore....we ALL have smartphones. And if we don't, we have a flip phone for some utilitarian reason.

What the hell is with the $40.00 smartphone access? It uses internet just the same as a tablet or any other device that has 3g/4g capabilities.

How long will this charade continue?

I sort of got it back in the old days...where your cell service generally tailored to your standard array of flip/candy bar phones. The new smartphone was a crazy new device that was "always connected" to the service providers internet service. Because of this, you generally paid a surcharge


I have a hard time understanding now why your Iphone/Android device should be charged $40.00 when they clearly still value other devices at a lower rate.
 
Switch to T-Mobile. My bill is $130/month for 5 phones. Each phone has 1GB+ data per month. I have truly unlimited LTE with 5GB of tethering.
 
It is not the why you are paying for part X, part Y, and part Z it is the final amount you give company A. Them marketing X, Y, and Z and how they convinced you it is reasonable is just in the end marketing made to make you feel good about the service and less angry with how much it is costing you.

In the end it is just negotiation. The marketing is just some fluff to make you feel like you got an awesome deal or a crappy deal even if the final cost is the same.
 
I've been living in 3 different countries for the last couple years and my mobile bills are so drastically different:

$12-$15 per month in 2 of them. $45 with straight talk in the USA. Service is definitely what I'd call spotty in the US too. It's bizarre to still have dropped calls and dead zones repeatedly every day.

US carriers pretty much screw us.
 
tsupersonic said:
What is this - I've never heard of this with Verizon or AT&T in the US (apologies if this is N/A for US)
Click to expand...

where are you from?

Your MORE Everything Plan Summary
Monthly Line Access
Smartphone $40
With Verizon Edge Discount $30

AT&T
Up to $25 savings (From $40.00 smartphone fee): Savings compares Mobile Share Value plan smartphone access charge for a smartphone w/ no annual service contract to a new smartphone activated on a 2-yr agrmt. Per smartphone access charge savings is $25 on plans 10 GB and larger and $15 for plans less than 10 GB. Plan & other charges and restr's apply. See att.com/mobilesharesavings for pricing req's.
 
randomrogue said:
I've been living in 3 different countries for the last couple years and my mobile bills are so drastically different:

$12-$15 per month in 2 of them. $45 with straight talk in the USA. Service is definitely what I'd call spotty in the US too. It's bizarre to still have dropped calls and dead zones repeatedly every day.

US carriers pretty much screw us.
Click to expand...

many european countries with these cheap plans barely have 3G, let alone 4G. You get what you pay for, and $15 doesn't fund LTE-A tower installations
 
Go to prepaid and be done with it. Then your $40 covers everything. That's the only way to make a statement to AT&T and Verizon.

Of course then people complain about the high price of phones. Can't have everything.
 
randomrogue said:
I've been living in 3 different countries for the last couple years and my mobile bills are so drastically different:

$12-$15 per month in 2 of them. $45 with straight talk in the USA. Service is definitely what I'd call spotty in the US too. It's bizarre to still have dropped calls and dead zones repeatedly every day.

US carriers pretty much screw us.
Click to expand...

Amen.

But for some reason, people in US supports their carriers like professional sports teams. It's really bazaar.
 
mizzou said:
where are you from?

Your MORE Everything Plan Summary
Monthly Line Access
Smartphone $40
With Verizon Edge Discount $30

AT&T
Up to $25 savings (From $40.00 smartphone fee): Savings compares Mobile Share Value plan smartphone access charge for a smartphone w/ no annual service contract to a new smartphone activated on a 2-yr agrmt. Per smartphone access charge savings is $25 on plans 10 GB and larger and $15 for plans less than 10 GB. Plan & other charges and restr's apply. See att.com/mobilesharesavings for pricing req's.
Click to expand...
I'm from the US, in NY. I have AT&T (Verizon in the past) now.

I'm on the 2GB mobile share plan, expensive...
Unlimited minutes/texting, 2GB data = ~$62 after taxes

I would pay full price if the device was reasonable (<$350 like Nexus territory) and make the plans cheaper! Hoping there is more competition for pricing in the US. It's quite pathetic amongst the big 4 carriers. T-Mobile is finally starting to do some nice things though.
 
Regarding the Verizon Share Everything plan.

All the data is pooled together and billed with the Share Everything account.

The Smartphone access fee is for the unlimited minutes, text, and hotspot that phone will use. So it's going to be more expensive than tablets that have no voice or text.

Feature phones are cheaper (I think $25), but don't have the hotspot either.
 
No such charge on my Verizon bill. The closest thing is "Nationwide Talk 450" and that is $39.99/month. Added to that is my data package with Hotspot (6GB) for $50.00. Add to that a variety of taxes and surcharges totalling $4.90.
 
Had AT&T and it cost $74.00 with an 18% company discount. Now I've gone to Crickett (still AT&T network) for a straight $40.00 prepay for everything. And if I go over my limit they will throttle me, but who cares, I don't watch TV or Netfilx on my phone (old Atrix) and with Xfinities WiFi hotspots I get WiFi everywhere now so I don't care if I get throttled.
 
senttoschool said:
Switch to T-Mobile. My bill is $130/month for 5 phones. Each phone has 1GB+ data per month. I have truly unlimited LTE with 5GB of tethering.
Click to expand...

This statement doesn't make any sense to me.

Which is it? Does each phone have 1GB+ data per month, or do you have truly unlimited LTE?
 
corkyg said:
No such charge on my Verizon bill. The closest thing is "Nationwide Talk 450" and that is $39.99/month. Added to that is my data package with Hotspot (6GB) for $50.00. Add to that a variety of taxes and surcharges totalling $4.90.
Click to expand...

The access fees are part of the group or family plans that carriers have rolled out. You pay X amount for the plan, and then an additional Y amount for each device/line you add to the plan. So you won't see this on individual plans since the plan and device/line are billed as the same thing.
 
Would OP prefer it if they were just called "Additional Line Fees" instead of singling out smartphone access?
 
openwheel said:
But for some reason, people in US supports their carriers like professional sports teams. It's really bazaar.
Click to expand...

Pretty much everyone I know hates their own carrier, be it for lousy coverage, bad customer service, high contract prices, etc.

Some of them are also the same people who won't move off of their shitty carrier even though they can totally do so with minimal sacrifice but are math-impaired and think a $600 unsubsidized phone is somehow more expensive than a $250 subsidized one.
 
OSULugan said:
This statement doesn't make any sense to me.

Which is it? Does each phone have 1GB+ data per month, or do you have truly unlimited LTE?
Click to expand...
he has 5 phones. base price includes unlimited text/minutes, 1GB data @ 4G/LTE, unlimited data after @ 2G (~10-20 kBytes/s)

base price is $50 (1st phone), $30(2nd phone), 3x$10(3rd, 4th, 5th) = $50+$30+3*$10 = $110

you can upgrade each line individually. tethering is always limited (500MB-5GB of tethering) -
+$10 = 3GB @ 4G, throttled to 2G after you go over
+$20 = 5GB @ 4G, throttled to 2G after you go over
+$30 = unlimited @ 4G

he probably has $110 + one line @ unlimited at the grandfathered price of +$20... so $130 total

AT&T and Verizon do data buckets.... one data bucket of say 10GB = $100, add however many lines @ $15-$40 each that share the bucket of data


depending on your family, it might make sense for each person to have their own data bucket (t-mobile/sprint style)... each person needs to control how fast they use their data or get throttled

or share a data bucket (mum/dad want smartphone but dont' use a lot of data... might as well share a 10GB $100 data bucket)
 
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Too bad the only carrier in NC where I live who has has good coverage is Verizon. But the lady gets a nice 22% discount with the local hospital. We have 4 lines and 10gb of data pool and pay ~$150 a month. All lines are off contract of course (verizon gives each line $25 off for that).
 
senttoschool said:
Switch to T-Mobile. My bill is $130/month for 5 phones. Each phone has 1GB+ data per month. I have truly unlimited LTE with 5GB of tethering.
Click to expand...

With 1GB of data you only have 1GB of LTE to use per month before you are dropped down to a slower speed. The Unlimited LTE plan costs $80 per line now(used to be $70 I think). So while you have unlimited data, you only get 1GB of LTE speeds. Unless you meant to say that you pay extra for your line to get the unlimited LTE like I do.

vi edit said:
Go to prepaid and be done with it. Then your $40 covers everything. That's the only way to make a statement to AT&T and Verizon.

Of course then people complain about the high price of phones. Can't have everything.
Click to expand...

Or lack of coverage in some areas and slower speeds since you are paying a company that leases some signal from a bigger carrier, the bigger carrier can prioritize it so their customers get the better speeds first.


Sheep said:
Pretty much everyone I know hates their own carrier, be it for lousy coverage, bad customer service, high contract prices, etc.

Some of them are also the same people who won't move off of their shitty carrier even though they can totally do so with minimal sacrifice but are math-impaired and think a $600 unsubsidized phone is somehow more expensive than a $250 subsidized one.
Click to expand...

To be fair a lot of people wouldn't have an iphone or Samsung/HTC android phone if they had to pay full price up front. The fact that they can pay $199 and walk out with the latest phone keeps them coming back but also locks them in for 2 years. If you're lucky, you pick a carrier that is good in your area and you don't have to worry. T-Mobile does it differently as I'm sure you are aware where you pay for the whole cost over time. So the carrier doesn't eat the cost difference initially and have to charge extra on the bill and lock you in with contracts, but you can still get whatever phone you want for manageable costs (around $27/mo for the flagship devices). They also got rid of the ETFs but replaced them with the clause that if you cancel your service you pay for the rest of the phone's retail cost. The benefit to the consumer is that you get both a cheaper plan and aren't paying $660 up front for a Galaxy S5 for example. Then they have other options where you can pay half the cost of the device, trade it in and take home a new device of your choice. If you happen to keep it for 2 years it will be paid off and you can do what you want with it and they will even accept it for trade-in and give you credit toward the cost of your next device if you wanted (although selling it outright will likely give you better value).
 
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OSULugan said:
This statement doesn't make any sense to me.

Which is it? Does each phone have 1GB+ data per month, or do you have truly unlimited LTE?
Click to expand...

A family plan with 5 phones.

4 phones with 1GB LTE then unlimited 2G. My own phone has unlimited LTE on phone + 5GB LTE for tethering.
 
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