Single Rate Northeast
Written: Apr 25 '01 (Updated Apr 25 '01)
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Pros: Call anywhere in the US with no long distance or roaming charges.
Cons: This only works if you're using the cellphone within the Northeast area.
The Bottom Line: Wouldn't hesitate to recommend this service to anyone whose needs fit this plan.
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| SusanARI's Full Review: General Reviews of Verizon Customer Service |
I am placing this epinion in the general reviews of Verizon section because though Epinions has categories for Verizon Mobile Phone Service in Las Vegas, Kansas City, Houston, Buffalo, Tampa, and assorted other cities...it does not have a category titled Verizon Mobile Phone Service in Providence (where my phone service is based from) or Boston (the area in which the cell phone is used the most).
SINGLE RATE NORTHEAST
We recently purchased a cellphone from Verizon and signed up for their newest calling plan - Single Rate Northeast.
This plan suited our needs perfectly due to the ability to make calls to anywhere in the United States without incurring any roaming or long distance charges.
Now there is one catch to this. If we travel outside the Northeast area with the cellphone and use it, we do get charged for roaming and long distance. The Northeast area would be all of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maryland, and Northern Virginia. Washington D.C. is also included. My other half is on the road a lot due to his job but does stick to the Northeast area so we were happy to find this particular plan which was less expensive than those with full nationwide coverage.
THE STORE
We walked into the Verizon store in the middle of a Saturday afternoon and found it to be very crowded. We thought for sure the whole thing was going to take a lot longer than we would expect or like it to. Well, we were wrong. There were a lot of customers but the store was more than adequately staffed. In less than a minute we were approached by a salesperson.
The salesperson we encountered appeared to be very knowledgeable about the service, plans, etc. Though we cut her off a few times due to the fact we'd already done our research and knew exactly what we wanted. The salesperson was also very pleasant.
PRICE
I did quite a bit of looking around as to the cost of phones and various plans with different cellular service providers. The price as well as good things we've heard from friends who use Verizon's service are what sold us on them.
From the ads I've seen, they always seem to have some phone on special for $20 or so. We had originally intended to go that route but didn't because the particular phone that was on sale that week was a flip down type phone and we just knew it wouldn't take my other half long to break that part. Waiting another week for a different phone to be on sale was not an option for us. My other half needed a phone for work that following Monday.
They had a wide variety of phones covering a great range of prices...anywhere from $60 to over $200. We went with the Audiovox CDM-135 for $60. And we've been very happy with it so far. I should get around to writing an epinion on it soon.
The salesperson gave us an earpiece for handsfree conversations with this phone for free. We paid thirty something dollars for the adapter that plugs into the cigarette lighter to maintain a charge. The regular desktop type charger was free.
For the actual calling plan, we chose the $55 Single Rate Northeast Plan which gives us 550 anytime minutes as well as a bonus of 250 weekend minutes.
This particular plan starts out at a price of $35 per month for 300 base minutes all the way to $200 per month for 3000 base minutes. The above quoted prices do not include any bonus minutes you'd get depending on what kind of promotion they're offering at the time you go in.
Now where you have to be really careful is in figuring out ahead of time how many minutes you'll require. See, if you go over your minute allowance, you'll be charged 40 cents per minute with our plan. And also roaming charges are 60 cents per minute if you travel outside the Northeast area. So if there's any doubt you might be leaving the area, don't go with this plan.
There was also a $25 activation charge which they'll waive if you sign a 2 year contract. We chose not to do this and paid the activation fee with a 1 year contract.
There are also weekend and night/weekend options which allow you to purchase additional night/weekend minutes for an additional small monthly fee.
ADDITIONAL FEATURES
Voicemail is included in your cellular phone service at no additional charge and I've found the system to be very user-friendly.
There's also a message indicator feature that works with most phones (it works on hours) which tells you how many voice mail messages you have as soon as you turn on your phone. It displays this information on the screen.
The sales representative was also willing to include 2 free months of mobile web for free. This enables the phone to receive text email messages.
FINAL THOUGHTS
We've had Verizon's Cellular Phone Service for about a month now and have been happy with it so far. My other half has traveled all over the Northeast area with it and he's never had a problem with reception. And nobody's had a problem hearing him either. We've encountered no areas where connection to the service wasn't possible. It's been there for us anywhere/anytime we've needed it.
We've also received our first bill and surprisingly enough had no problems understanding it :)
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 55/month
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Epinions.com ID:
SusanARI
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Member: Susan
Location: Punta Gorda, FL
Reviews written: 101
Trusted by: 113 members
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