Well I cancelled my Verizon contract the other day

[noahmijo]

I've recently switched over to T-Mobile. What a difference, for starters you're allowed to hack it (for the purposes of personalizing) in seconds with the right tools.

The honest fact of the matter is it's not entirely the issue with them helping the government snoop it's virtually everything about their business practices.

Namely the last straw aside from the snooping thing, was the fact that they disable their OBEX therefore you cannot personally customize YOUR OWN PHONE THAT YOU PAID SERIOUS $$$ for and you STILL are told you have to pay outrageous service fees for photos, music, ect and to boot choose from a catalog that seems like it was chosen by some 15 year old who watches nothing but EmptyV. As a technology professional it infuriates me to see a company purposefully lock down a device in a way that it cannot be personalized for the purposes of generating that much more profit just nickel and dime across the board-that shit is pathetic especially considering that Verizon is as far as I know the wealthiest cell service.


Well of course I am going to get hit with probably with some bad termination fees, but T-Mobile was pretty sympathic to that and did give me a little helping hand. When I get a chance the CEO of Verizon is going to get a letter from me explaining to him why I cancelled a family plan despite the fact that I had a nice discount going for me due to my job He is basically going to be called out for the scumbag that he is and I will let him know that I plan on screwing up business for the company as much as I can by notifying people that Verizon is in the practice of suppressing the use of technology on a device that you paid for--but they feel you have no right to personalize it. That's like buying new house and having the bank say you have to keep every door to every room closed and locked. Unacceptable. Of course I'll also mention the fact that they are Republican donors and their complacency in shredding the 4th amendment.


If you are with Verizon I'm not going to preach to you to quit because I know the termination fees especially from these pricks will come down hard, but I would urge you to see what other cell companies might offer after you explain to them your situation with the strong termination fees, ect. You know how you're in the mall and you walk past those annoying wireless services salesmen and they keep calling you out to come talk to them? respond with "Hey I'm currently with Verizon and I'm happy, what will you do better? will you help any with my termination fees?"

I always said whether you want to call it Capitalism or free market or whatever I wish we lived in a fair market but we don't. So long as they're going to screw with us we might as well give some back too and use their own system against them whenever we can.

[CoffeeCat]

1. Good for you...

I'm in the process of nixing Verizon. I'm doing it slowly though, because I want to protect myself.

I was on auto pay. They took my monthly payment out of my bank account.

Last week, I requested that they send me a paper bill and cancell the auto pay. I thought that was an imperative first step. Another poster said that they cancelled in one fell swoop, and that she had problems connected with the auto-pay.

So...now we're on paper billing. I'll cancel soon.

I'm curious about the cancellation fees you mentioned. We signed up for a one-year contract. That ended in Jan 06. So, as far as I know...we're month to month, with no other contractual obligations. Does Verizon hit you with cancellations fees, anyway? Any info would be greatly appreciated.

Like you, I plan to write a letter explaining that I cancelled because they sold my info to the government. Oh, what a letter it will be.

Good for you, for doing this. The only way these corporations will feel it---is if we don't give them our dollars.

[noahmijo]

3. Well I predict the fees will break down like this

Termination fees exist because of the fact that when you signed a contract the company subsidized the actual cost of your equipment (phone) Therefore if you cancel out of the contract they have to defray the cost of the equipment onto you so that they don't lose money.

I had two V3 Razrs on my account and the Verizon contract states that cancelling early can result in charges of up to $175 per phone. Obviously in my case they're going to go all out on me.

I also heard a rumor that REGARDLESS of your phone model, you could have the cheapest model they have available and they (Verizon) will still treat you like you bought a damn Treo 650 or something and make you pay the full penalty of $175 per line.


I'll let you know how it goes for me, but in the long all I will say is that despite these termination fees, with T-Mobile I am going to save in the long run and their service is FAR better and as I was saying I highly appreciate the fact that they do not force you to use their services for tunes, photos, ect.

[pooja]

7. if your contract is up--you are not obligated to stay with the

provider... you can move on "freely" to another provider... Warning with T-mobile. the plans are low and the service is pretty good as far as providers go, but watch the signal strength. In a lot of places the signal is very weak, and they use a lot of cingular towers.... just watch it.

[Breeze54]

2. I have to use the verizon landline

but kudo's to you for telling them to take a hike! lol
I have a 'throw-away' cellphone for emergencies only. I never use it.
I don't support Murdoch either (DTV) or cable tv. ;)

"EmptyV" <-- made me :)

[noahmijo]

5. hehe "EmptyV" used to be cool back in the day

Headbanger's ball, back when they would play you know MUSIC acts, today you turn it on and I have to watch Paris Hilton shop for 4 hours.

[Selatius]

4. That's capitalism, baby

Namely the last straw aside from the snooping thing, was the fact that they disable their OBEX therefore you cannot personally customize YOUR OWN PHONE THAT YOU PAID SERIOUS $$$ for and you STILL are told you have to pay outrageous service fees for photos, music, ect and to boot choose from a catalog that seems like it was chosen by some 15 year old who watches nothing but EmptyV. As a technology professional it infuriates me to see a company purposefully lock down a device in a way that it cannot be personalized for the purposes of generating that much more profit just nickel and dime across the board-that shit is pathetic especially considering that Verizon is as far as I know the wealthiest cell service.

What they've done here is what you say: Squeeze out every last nickel and dime from your wallet. Perhaps that is why they became the wealthiest cell service? They did it by asserting complete control over your phone. The basic fact is without control, there can be no capitalism. Private control over land, control over equipment, control over food (See genetically modified food), even control over music and works of art, etc.--it's what makes it possible for capitalism to exist, and if they had their way, things like public education and Social Security would be privately controlled as well, and those services would no longer exist to help people but, rather, just to provide a profit to the shareholders. If you can't pay out of your pocket for those services? Too bad.

[Pavulon]

6. CALEA

They all comply and all cooperate with the TLA agencies.

[brentspeak]

8. Is Verizon also snooping on its DSL service?

I don't have to worry about my Verizon phone service because I never use it except to provide for Verizon DSL. The DSL, though, is another matter.

[CountAllVotes]

9. I managed to pretty much dump AT&T

I joined up again with my old telephone carrier that is located in India. They have their own phone lines. Cost is minimum of $10 a month.

It is ok. No access #'s to dial or anything and they don't keep records much. So, I joined up with them again. It is nice to be able to pick-up the phone and just dial when I want to make a call rather than wait for the tone or whatever. Cost is 3.5 cents a minute for toll and charges within the state and 7 cents a minute for out-of-state calls.

I really don't care at this point as I don't use my phone much anyway.

So, I crawled back to the phone service in India rather shamefully. However, they were very nice about it I must admit and they are going to reimburse me for the switching charges from AT&T too. :D

:dem: :kick:

[peacetalksforall]

10. noahmijo, can you answer some questions - I'm currently on

qwest, but it is absurdly expensive and the so-called protection of their not cooperating in spying is diluted in that some of my calls are either from or to an AT&T or SoBell user. Plus, I want to abandon all companies that outsource. Qwest is notorious for outsourcing.

Anyway, my contract expires somewhat soon and Id like to check out options.

Did you check out the political affiliation of T-Mobile?

How do their fees compare to Verizon?

I want something very simple. I'm not exactly sure what all you might mean by personalizing it - I just want simple stuff. I do want clarity. I don't want or need music and images. In addition, I tend to block out tech talk when I'm not in need so I become ignorant fast.

Can you comment about politics, service, and any other reason for choosing them over the non-NSA and known NSA participating corporations. It's obvious that our options have narrowed considerably.

I'd appreciate more of what you have to say. Thanks for positng. Timely for me.

[Breeze54]

12. Take a good long look......

The Axis of Corporate Evil
http://www.hereinreality.com/news/axis.html

[noahmijo]

13. Sure here ya go

*Forgot to mention TMobile is German based so as far as outsourcing goes..Plus good luck finding that, even Verizon has call centers in Canada.

Did you check out the political affiliation of T-Mobile?

I always go to BuyBlue.org for that stuff. They appear to donate to both parties, but in the past and currently they appear to be strong Democratic supporters.

Donor info~~~~~> http://www.buyblue.org/node/1956/view/summary

Also note the article ~~~>http://www.buyblue.org/node/6238

How do their fees compare to Verizon?

Well I was on the family plan at 700 minutes and Tmobile charges $10 less a month with all the same features that Verizon offers. I would say at a glance overall it seems like TMobile is equal or cheaper to Verizon's fees

INSURANCE.

Most companies' insurance plans charge a pretty hefty premium for phones like the Razr or Treo (I have two Razrs) Verizon for example charged me $8 per month per phone and to boot your "coverage" meant that if your phone was lost or damaged they'd give you some refurbished phone of "equal" value.

With TMobile I had the choice to pay $4 a month or just a flat rate of $40 for the whole year per phone (which is what I chose) and it's in writing that your phone replacement is brand new same model or updated model of the one you lost/broke. Tie this in with a dedutible of $35 vs $50 from Verizon.

I want something very simple. I'm not exactly sure what all you might mean by personalizing it - I just want simple stuff. I do want clarity. I don't want or need music and images. In addition, I tend to block out tech talk when I'm not in need so I become ignorant fast.

That will all depend on the phone itself not really the service so much. For what it's worth though Verizon puts these incredibly ugly red bars on the top and bottom of your screen which you cannot remove-EVER. It's another way Verizon assume full control of your phone and what goes in and out of it. TMobile has a very nice interface which you can change to your liking at will, and even if you're not into personalizing it's still nice to be able to simply say "That color hurts my eyes" ::a couple keystrokes later:: "Ahh much better!"

You can't do that with Verizon, if you go with them you better like staring at red bars at the bottom and top of your screen.

Can you comment about politics, service, and any other reason for choosing them over the non-NSA and known NSA participating corporations. It's obvious that our options have narrowed considerably.

My readings currently suggest that they are not cooperating with the NSA. Others may dig up something else that proves otherwise but untill then... As you said as well, it's hard to find a cell company or ANY corporation that doesn't in some way fuck the people or the workers over. Unless the company's mission is based on gaining profit through socially responsible ethics (i.e. Ben and Jerry's, Bath and Bodyworks, ect) you're just looking for the lesser of all the evils.

Thus far I am high satisifed with TMoble, though it's only been a couple days since I've had it. The fact that I can personalize my own phone is a big deal to me and to tell you the truth I shamefully admit that that was the last straw..right before I found out about the NSA thing. Also TMobile did for me in 5 hours what Verizon couldn't do in less than 3 weeks-they ported my service over, made their contracts very clear and unlike Verizon they did not bullshit me-it was clear cut plain and simple here it is in writing, overnight I already had my numbers transferred and I had access to all my information concerning my account online.

It took Verizon over 3 weeks to do this and on top of that still charged me for a full month's use when I didn't even start using the phone until the final week of the month.


I would advise you to shop around, as I said they want to play the Free Market game my favorite lesson in one of my Economics classes was when we studied game theory and ultimately the lesson was this"

"If you can't win the game you're playing then change the game"

Go out there and make these companies bow for you and insist on getting any deals you can get-they are always willing to negotiate ALWAYS they want your business. You wouldn't believe how a salesperson might charge a customer for their new phone with contract, and how with the next customer they'll just throw in the phone for free after the customer just did 5 minutes of wheeling and dealing.

At the bare minimum they should help you out with any termination fees, or if they can't do that then ask for a discount on equipment, insurance, rates anything you think you'd like. Also compare what you've been told right to their faces i.e. "Well Cingular told me they'd help me with 40% of my termination fees...how much will YOU help?"

Like I've always said the company is in the business of making profit-well so should the consumer be

~N~

OH! PS I just found this coverage map from TMobile. Just gave me another reason to like them. They outright tell you where you're going to get good or shitty service. Pop the address of your digs in and find out if your signal would be in any good with them.

http://compass.t-mobile.com/default.aspx

[unhappycamper]

11. I cancelled my cell service with these Nazi pricks last month.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=158x8709

[Fla Dem]

14. Use Trac Fone or another non subscription service. n/t

[KAT119]

15. Thanks for the info. looking for BLUEST cellphone co.