“Thank you for being a Verizon customer. We are committed to bringing you the best experience on your Shared Data plan. Due to rising operational costs, you’ll see an increase of $12/mo. on your current plan, which will appear on your bill as a separate charge, no sooner than 8.2.22,” the email reads (via).
Verizon is preparing for another price hike
As said earlier, this comes just a few months after Verizon increased the administrative fee by an additional $1.35 per voice line, taking it up to $3.30. The company also introduced an “Economic Adjustment Charge,” adding another $2.20 to the monthly bill of its customers. The new prices are effective this month. Now, if you’re on Verizon’s Shared Data plans, be prepared for another major hit to your wallet. Starting in August, you will see a whopping $12 added to your plan cost every month. And you’ll likely not get any benefit for the extra charge. To its credit, Verizon did include 5GB of mobile hotspot data with the entry-level 5G Start unlimited mobile plan following the previous price increase. However, that does little justice to its customers. Amid an inflation crisis, Verizon is directly hitting its customers’ wallets to pad its profit margins. Despite a 2.1 percent year-on-year (YoY) increase in revenues, which reached $33.6 billion in Q1 2022, the company’s net income was down 12.4 percent YoY in the first quarter of this year. This is due to increased operational costs. Unfortunately, the carrier is making its customers bear the brunt of it. No wonder T-Mobile publicly criticized Verizon for this. The self-proclaimed “Un-carrier” labeled this price hike with baseless made-up fees as “downright disgusting”. The company also directed its criticism towards AT&T, which recently raised its prices as well. AT&T customers on its legacy phone plans have to shell out up to $6 a month extra for a single line and $12 a month for family plans following the latest hike. T-Mobile, on the other hand, has launched a Price Lock model. The company promises a fixed rate for your phone plan for as long as you remain on it. The price will remain unchanged unless you switch to another plan. The Un-carrier also offers Price Lock for its broadband services.
