Why does Verizon say their unlimited data plan is $29.99/mo but charge over $60?

You don’t just pay for the data – you also pay for the minutes plan and probably texting plan.

Right like @papayalily said the 29.99 is for the data only. You still have to pay for your minutes and your text messages (which a lot technically data do not actually count as data)

OP here

I’m not counting minutes and texting – the above mentioned charges are just for the data plan.

So then you need to take it to a Verizon store and have someone explain the charges to you.

Most first month charges are either smaller or larger than your final bill will be, rarely will it reflect your true recurring cost. This number depends on whether you are pre or postpaid and a ton of other arbitrary shit on the part of the company.

FEEL FREE TO SKIP THIS: For example, if postpaid and if your billing cycle starts on the first, and you purchased your phone on the 15th, you would on your first/second bill have charges for your regular cost in addition to your cost for the two weeks you had your phone before you first full billing cycle went into effect. But if you get your phone before you hit some magical date in verizons database for when you pay for the two weeks in addittion to the monthly cycle and you end up paying a small bill cycle it could look cheaper in your first few bills than it will be in the end. And there’s like ten different ways things can change. Blah blah blah…

It’s really fucking confusing.

You should go to a Verizon store and have them explain it to you, but honestly I would imagine your bill is going to hover in the $70s – because it’s my understanding that the Palm Pre cannot be purchased without a voice contract, the cheapest of which is $40. Adding in your $30 and adding taxes… You’re looking at high $70s. Double check over the phone if you have any subscriptions on the phone you’re unaware of. And double check to see if the salesmen added anything that was a ‘trial offer’ or ‘free for 30 days’ kind of thing and have it removed.

Look over your paperwork again – this time read it. Because you must not have in the store. If you’re unsatisfied with the contract or the response in store well, you might be shit out luck, since you’re outside of 30 days you may have to pay a cancellation fee.

By your fourth month, provided there are no downloads, subscriptions, etc on your account you should start seeing your most accurate monthly service charge.

Worked at a cell phone company reviewing bills and accounts for a living.

!st month you were “pro-rated” so you didn’t pay the full amount…(depending on your billing cycle and when the feature/plan was added or changed)

2nd month you were charged the full amount of the feature/plan

5 min google search could be wrong…

Recently (November) Verizion changed their unlimited data plan…

old plan $29.99 max 5gig use
new plan $69.99

@coffeenut That’s the unlimited data AND unlimited text plan w/450 minutes.

Make sure that your account is set up correctly. You can do that by reviewing your bill online and looking at the features you’re signed up for. I recently found out that somehow my phone was being charged $25 a month for ringtone services, which I never requested or used, and my daughter was being charged $10 a month for Tetris, which she thought was a one-time download charge of $5. We all had service to Canada at $5 a month, which was never requested. That’s $55 a month in charges we did not request.

That sounds messed up. I have a Droid X so (naturally) I have Verizon and a data plan.

My phone bill runs around $100/month for two lines, 700 minutes voice, no text, unlimited data, roadsides assistance, and insurance. Before I upgraded, I had the same plan minus the data and insurance and it was around $70. Note the difference is pretty close to $29.99, the advertised price? Except for the first bill after I got it; they pro-rated the data plan to half-price as I didn’t get it until the middle of my billing cycle.

Instead of just getting pissed off at Verizon, maybe you should talk to them and ask “What gives?”. My experience with them over the years has been good, and whenever I’ve had an issue, it was worked out to my satisfaction within five minutes. The only people I know that have had problems with them (or most other companies) are the type of people who prefer to vent their spleen instead of deal with the problem directly.

@asmonet @BarnacleBill Pretty much. However, you would be either amazed or disheartened by the number of people who don’t read stuff and then get mad when things don’t go according to their plan. Look how many people buy electronic things for all of the cool stuff they can do, don’t RTFM to figure out how to make their new toy do all of those cool things, and then bitch about it. HDTV won’t hook itself up!

@jerv: Oh, I’m fully aware of how often that occurs. Like I said, I worked for AT&T. My job specifically was to call customers and FIX their plans/features/contracts so that they weren’t getting dicked every month. If this guy had been one of my customers I would have ended up calling him when it came across my desk to fix everything. I got in equal parts screaming crazy foaming at the mouth psychopaths and thankful wants to cook me breakfast in bed and be my best friend people. That job was an eye-opener.