Verizon = Good or Bad? - Page 2

**CingularDuality** · 10-15-2007, 08:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnDeaD77

Verizon is awful here. Calls just drop out of no where sometimes, and then it does not give me the call dropped notification, so I'll find myself still talking for a few seconds before I realize it. I've got a samsung phone too. Anyone know that update code for Verizon btw?

Yep, we have Verizon for work, and it sucks butt. Between my office and home, there are 4 areas with no service. I also get no service inside certain buildings, while Cingular/ATT and Sprint/Nextel work fine.

I also hate the fact that even though I get a decent signal at home, and can make phone calls, sometimes my phone will never ring and I'll get a voicemail notification a day later. VERY frustrating.

Oh, and it must be nice for you guys that have had good luck with their customer service. I've literally been cussed at by them. Of course, that was when I mentioned that they didn't even know how a decimal point works...

Soulja · 10-15-2007, 08:47 AM

Ok thanks everyone. ill be looking into those soon.

Beatnik · 10-15-2007, 09:45 AM

FYI - I think you have 30 days to "try out" Verizon's (and most carriers') service in which you can take your phone(s) back and cancel your contract. I had to do that with Verizon when I moved to Austin and since I got no call signal in my apartment, I was able to cancel 3 days later with no penalty.

Really, all the cell companies are more or less evil. It's just a matter of finding the one with respectable coverage, a decent phone, and not horrible service.

**UnDeaD77** · 10-15-2007, 09:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CingularDuality

Yep, we have Verizon for work, and it sucks butt. Between my office and home, there are 4 areas with no service. I also get no service inside certain buildings, while Cingular/ATT and Sprint/Nextel work fine.

I also hate the fact that even though I get a decent signal at home, and can make phone calls, sometimes my phone will never ring and I'll get a voicemail notification a day later. VERY frustrating.

Oh, and it must be nice for you guys that have had good luck with their customer service. I've literally been cussed at by them. Of course, that was when I mentioned that they didn't even know how a decimal point works...

Yeah man, I'll be in an area with great coverage, and it just switches to extended network, when I know that area has your typical coverage. I'll power down my phone, and turn it back on, seems to go back into regular signal, and not extended.

**Apophis** · 10-15-2007, 10:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CingularDuality

Yep, we have Verizon for work, and it sucks butt. Between my office and home, there are 4 areas with no service. I also get no service inside certain buildings, while Cingular/ATT and Sprint/Nextel work fine.

I also hate the fact that even though I get a decent signal at home, and can make phone calls, sometimes my phone will never ring and I'll get a voicemail notification a day later. VERY frustrating.

Oh, and it must be nice for you guys that have had good luck with their customer service. I've literally been cussed at by them. Of course, that was when I mentioned that they didn't even know how a decimal point works...

I would imagine that Verizon being a Bell Atlantic / NYNEX merge that service in the northeast would be better than in Texas. But you're certainly showing that region makes a big difference in service. Everything you said about Verizon down there, I would be saying about NEXTEL up here.

I wonder if there's a web site out there that tracks ACTUAL coverage areas for cell providers nationwide. Something that would be updated by cell users rather than cell providers.

I have never needed Verizon customer service before, so I can't attest to any horror stories there. But I am well aware of their math problems.

Lets just hope I never need to experience that part of the company.

**Damonte** · 10-15-2007, 11:17 AM

To start, let me explain my experience background. I work for a company in the Washington, DC metro area and our primary client is a three letter acronym (read: government). I work in the client solutions engineering team, and we have wireless devices from all four major vendors. We have PDA phones, Treos, boardband air cards, and we have things that are not in the channel yet. Yes, we have the Verizon Wireless xw6800 (their version of the Sprint Mogul).

What is our conclusion after a solid year of testing, design and support? The CDMA vendors (Sprint, Verizon Wireless) offer better performance and speed than the GSM (T-Mobile, Cingular/ATT) vendors. Between the CDMA vendors, Verizon Wireless has the best network hands down. Hands. Down. We support over 600 sites across the United states, and Verizon Wireless has far and away the most extensive coverage with the strongest signal. Why? Because Verizon Wireless is the ONLY carrier (CDMA and GSM) that has an analog network still.

Now then... CDMA broadband versus GSM broadband. EVD0 rev0 versus HSDPA rev0. EVDOr0 has higher throughput than HSDPA and it's been out in the market for over a year. And if you think EVD0r0 is fast, just wait for EVD0r1 to come out. Once HSDPAr1 comes out, it'll give EVD0 a run for the money.

And finally... Verizon Wireless is gradually moving to 4G using Long Term Evolution (LTE). The GSM carriers have already moved to a CDMA base. All the wireless carriers are going to end up on this wide spectrum of CDMA on the base, ultimately providing more compatibility between the carriers. How much and just when it'll happen is still unknown. Perhaps in 2012?

Edit: Much of people's gripes about carriers are the result of bad phones. For the most part, LG and Motorola are the best choices. My personal (and professional) experience has indicated that Motorola does make some of the most well designed (read: reliability) phones. I will always gladly sacrifice features for operational stability.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pokerface

They REALLY need to add an unlimited messaging plan. REALLY.

VZW's decent. They're getting better.

Verizon Wireless does have unlimited picture and text messaging (to anyone on any network) if you choose one of their 'Select' plans. Also, Verizon Wireless recently switched their policy that if a customer changes their rate plan, it does not restart their contract term.

Soulja · 10-15-2007, 05:12 PM

ok, i read through all of the posts, thank you guys so much. and also, we live in hammond, which is the city bordering illinois, right next to Chicago, but anyway, we are kinda of on poorer side (we have a decent house and we make a living good, but we cant afford the nice stuff) so we can only go with the MOST basic plan. so we got the 700 minutes free after 9pm and free weekends. (idk why i added that in case anyone wanna know)

also, we are about to leave to find out in like, 1 hour but, i have 2 phones from sprint (decent phones) and my mom was gonna see if she can use them subbing in for the samsungs. 2 things: 1. will they let you sub in a phone YOU have for the one they gave u for free? 2. if and will they let you use another carriers phone to sub in i.e A Sprint phone instead of a Verizon phone.

Soulja · 10-15-2007, 08:41 PM

UPDATE: Ok, went out all night looking around, found out that we DID have 30 days to cancel, so we did, we are going with US Cellular, im getting that moto KRZR in red/black for that aids foundation thing, and mom and sis are getting razrs and stuff so awesome, its also cheaper. so thanks to everyone who helped me get this. i appreciate it. i woulda been screwed without you guys! *gives everyone giant bear hugs* =P

**DigitalAssassin** · 10-15-2007, 09:03 PM

I guess I'm one of the few (or only so far) on this thread who has T-Mobile. Pretty ironic as I could get a better deal from them then Sprint, who has a huge campus right here in KC.

For $10 more a month then I was paying for 300 minutes and a single phone with Sprint we got 2 phones and 1000 minutes + free mobile-to-mobile with T-Mobile. Haven't really had to call customer service much as our signal and coverage has been great.

Did get a bit frustrated with them last week as my wife's phone had the outside LCD start leaking (through no fault of ours, no dropping, no water, nothing) so we called and they said it still had a month under warranty so they would replace it with the current model, which was a Razr v3. Even asked them to verify that and they said absolutely.

Got our last bill and there was a $100 charge for a non-warranty equipment replacement. Called them up and they said the guy we talked to last week was incorrect in his understanding of the situation. I work in customer service so I know the game. Asked for a supervisor and managed to get them to eat $75 of the $100 charge. I just didn't like the way they went about talking to us or I wouldn't have pushed it so far.

Now I just wish they would get some decent Hotspot @ Home phones (yeah, they have a crackberry that supports it now but I don't need that much of a phone) so I could ditch the TW Digital Phone and save another ~$35/month.

**Trooper** · 10-15-2007, 09:08 PM

No one has mentioned them but Alltel has a great service. Ive had them for 6 years and can only think of a few dropped calls. Their plans are great, cheap for a ton of options. Their phone selection is usually months behind everyone else but they usually have good ones. The sweet deal with alltel is they share towers with sprint, so you usually have service every where.

Now Alltel isn't offered in most of Indiana but i went to college in Marion Indiana. I had great service and heard nothing but crap from people who had us cellular and cingular/at&t. So if you can find it get alltel. Their data plans are probably the best in the market, unlimited data/text/photos for around 80bucks. I plan on getting a moto Q in feb.

**CingularDuality** · 10-15-2007, 10:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Apophis

I would imagine that Verizon being a Bell Atlantic / NYNEX merge that service in the northeast would be better than in Texas. But you're certainly showing that region makes a big difference in service. Everything you said about Verizon down there, I would be saying about NEXTEL up here.

I wonder if there's a web site out there that tracks ACTUAL coverage areas for cell providers nationwide. Something that would be updated by cell users rather than cell providers.

I have never needed Verizon customer service before, so I can't attest to any horror stories there. But I am well aware of their math problems.

Lets just hope I never need to experience that part of the company.

Yeah, I know that service quality is VERY regional. I think that goes back to the quality of all the baby bells, no?

Anyway, I forgot to mention that Verizon was COMPLETELY shut down for about 6 hours the Friday before last. No voice, no data, no text, no nada all afternoon! My office decided that having JUST Verizon phones was a bad idea and we're getting some Cingular/ATT phones for emergency use in the office and for international travel.

**UnDeaD77** · 10-15-2007, 11:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CingularDuality

Yeah, I know that service quality is VERY regional. I think that goes back to the quality of all the baby bells, no?

Anyway, I forgot to mention that Verizon was COMPLETELY shut down for about 6 hours the Friday before last. No voice, no data, no text, no nada all afternoon! My office decided that having JUST Verizon phones was a bad idea and we're getting some Cingular/ATT phones for emergency use in the office and for international travel.

Man..thats what that damn problem was? I would start to dial, and it would go right into extended network. Everytime too.

**Pokerface** · 10-15-2007, 11:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Damonte

Verizon Wireless does have unlimited picture and text messaging (to anyone on any network) if you choose one of their 'Select' plans.

In-network doesn't count for beans to me. That's like handing someone a credit card with no limit, but telling them they can only use it at The Gap.

nhammen · 10-16-2007, 01:21 AM

Just to let everyone know, Verizon is awesome in Houston, but Sprint and Cingular are both awful here. I don't know about the others...

**Damonte** · 10-16-2007, 08:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pokerface

Quote:

Originally Posted by Damonte

Verizon Wireless does have unlimited picture and text messaging (to anyone on any network) if you choose one of their 'Select' plans.

In-network doesn't count for beans to me. That's like handing someone a credit card with no limit, but telling them they can only use it at The Gap.

I believe you might have mis-read my comment. I am indicating that Verizon Wireless offers unlimited messaging (picture and text) to anyone on any network, not just within the Verizon Wireless network.

10-15-2007, 08:47 AM	#17 (permalink)
Soulja Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Indiana, USA Age: 16 Posts: 604	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? Ok thanks everyone. ill be looking into those soon. __________________ My Myspace: www.myspace.com/_shatteredsoul_ <-- Add me!

10-15-2007, 09:45 AM	#18 (permalink)
Beatnik Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Austin, TX Age: 33 Posts: 4,312	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? FYI - I think you have 30 days to "try out" Verizon's (and most carriers') service in which you can take your phone(s) back and cancel your contract. I had to do that with Verizon when I moved to Austin and since I got no call signal in my apartment, I was able to cancel 3 days later with no penalty. Really, all the cell companies are more or less evil. It's just a matter of finding the one with respectable coverage, a decent phone, and not horrible service. __________________ -F- Beatnik

10-15-2007, 05:12 PM	#22 (permalink)
Soulja Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Indiana, USA Age: 16 Posts: 604	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? ok, i read through all of the posts, thank you guys so much. and also, we live in hammond, which is the city bordering illinois, right next to Chicago, but anyway, we are kinda of on poorer side (we have a decent house and we make a living good, but we cant afford the nice stuff) so we can only go with the MOST basic plan. so we got the 700 minutes free after 9pm and free weekends. (idk why i added that in case anyone wanna know) also, we are about to leave to find out in like, 1 hour but, i have 2 phones from sprint (decent phones) and my mom was gonna see if she can use them subbing in for the samsungs. 2 things: 1. will they let you sub in a phone YOU have for the one they gave u for free? 2. if and will they let you use another carriers phone to sub in i.e A Sprint phone instead of a Verizon phone. __________________ My Myspace: www.myspace.com/_shatteredsoul_ <-- Add me!

10-15-2007, 08:41 PM	#23 (permalink)
Soulja Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Indiana, USA Age: 16 Posts: 604	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? UPDATE: Ok, went out all night looking around, found out that we DID have 30 days to cancel, so we did, we are going with US Cellular, im getting that moto KRZR in red/black for that aids foundation thing, and mom and sis are getting razrs and stuff so awesome, its also cheaper. so thanks to everyone who helped me get this. i appreciate it. i woulda been screwed without you guys! gives everyone giant bear hugs =P __________________ My Myspace: www.myspace.com/_shatteredsoul_ <-- Add me!

10-15-2007, 09:03 PM	#24 (permalink)
DigitalAssassin Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Kansas City Age: 35 Posts: 1,583	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? I guess I'm one of the few (or only so far) on this thread who has T-Mobile. Pretty ironic as I could get a better deal from them then Sprint, who has a huge campus right here in KC. For $10 more a month then I was paying for 300 minutes and a single phone with Sprint we got 2 phones and 1000 minutes + free mobile-to-mobile with T-Mobile. Haven't really had to call customer service much as our signal and coverage has been great. Did get a bit frustrated with them last week as my wife's phone had the outside LCD start leaking (through no fault of ours, no dropping, no water, nothing) so we called and they said it still had a month under warranty so they would replace it with the current model, which was a Razr v3. Even asked them to verify that and they said absolutely. Got our last bill and there was a $100 charge for a non-warranty equipment replacement. Called them up and they said the guy we talked to last week was incorrect in his understanding of the situation. I work in customer service so I know the game. Asked for a supervisor and managed to get them to eat $75 of the $100 charge. I just didn't like the way they went about talking to us or I wouldn't have pushed it so far. Now I just wish they would get some decent Hotspot @ Home phones (yeah, they have a crackberry that supports it now but I don't need that much of a phone) so I could ditch the TW Digital Phone and save another ~$35/month. __________________

10-15-2007, 09:08 PM	#25 (permalink)
Trooper Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: In my wifes house......if she says i can Age: 25 Posts: 8,558	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? No one has mentioned them but Alltel has a great service. Ive had them for 6 years and can only think of a few dropped calls. Their plans are great, cheap for a ton of options. Their phone selection is usually months behind everyone else but they usually have good ones. The sweet deal with alltel is they share towers with sprint, so you usually have service every where. Now Alltel isn't offered in most of Indiana but i went to college in Marion Indiana. I had great service and heard nothing but crap from people who had us cellular and cingular/at&t. So if you can find it get alltel. Their data plans are probably the best in the market, unlimited data/text/photos for around 80bucks. I plan on getting a moto Q in feb. __________________ that sounds like a good idea trooper. -Vulcan

10-16-2007, 01:21 AM	#29 (permalink)
nhammen Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Texas Age: 23 Posts: 205	Re: Verizon = Good or Bad? Just to let everyone know, Verizon is awesome in Houston, but Sprint and Cingular are both awful here. I don't know about the others... __________________ - Drake_Anra

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