That may actually be what Verizon plans on rolling out this summer, and it may end up saving several people decent amounts of cash on their plan, but Verizon sees it as a way to make even more money long-term. Verizon Communications CFO Fran Shammo believes shared data plans and access to tethering will lead to more consumption, forcing people into higher-tiered, more-expensive data plans.
“I think revenue ARPU [average revenue per user] will continue to grow as we get into data share plans and people start to connect more devices [on the network].*As they add more devices, they are going to have to buy up into tiers. So again, you will see the revenue increase there.”
So while you may be paying a bit less on the lower end, Verizon is betting that as their customers become more and more mobile, they’ll use their cellular connection to hook up laptops and tablets to their Verizon 4G network, and 5GB of monthly data will no longer be enough to get you through the month without either needing to switch to a higher tier or suffer significant overage charges. If you happened to get in on Verizon’s unlimited data before they took that benefit away, you’ll be forced into the data share plans once you upgrade. There’s a possibility customers can keep unlimited 4G data by purchasing phones at full retail price, though we won’t hold our breath on that one. Verizon didn’t immediately respond to our question about this workaround.
that might be an interesting line of attack in these court battles. That is how they nailed Al Capone.
that is just what they were hoping for....create a data craze and reap overages and tier upgrades. It's basically Drug Dealer 101. Give them a taste and get them hooked.
