Virgin Mobile Broadband2go....Shafts Customers

[TxPhotoShooter]

So after forking out about $400 on hardware this Christmas for my 2 sons, Virgin Mobile has severely restricted its original offering. The $40 unlimited plan being sold then and pushed by Best Buy is now $50 a month with a cap at 2.5 gig. Also once you reach 2.5gig you can go over but your speed is reduced to 256 kbps. And there is no grandfathering included so loyal customers are getting it stuck to them.

I would like to talk with Best Buy but I'm pretty sure of the song they will sing.

[Abel]

but are the first people signed up kinda grandfathered into the original plan.

i know that was the case with my iphone and unlimited data plan...

[TxPhotoShooter]

From what I read, no one will be grandfathered. I guess that is because service is from month to month.

One thing that I am wondering about has to do with Best Buy. When I went into purchase the iPads, I asked for 3 of the lowest priced 3G iPads. The salesman talked me into buying the lowest non-3G and purchasing 2 Virgin Mobile wireless MiFi hotspots. He said I would be spending about the same amount of money but the cost of wireless service would be much cheaper. Now I wonder if Best Buy knew what was about to happen and was looking to dump their hardware.

[Tom]

Hey Virgins, thanks for nothing!

[KenJulio]

Are you under contract? If so, you may be able to get out of it without paying a termination fee due to the change of the contract you signed originally. If you're going month to month, then you have the choice to leave and use the phones you currently have on another provider. You'll need to check which basebands your phones work on and call ATT or TMO, if CDMA, then Verizon/Sprint. So you can go month to month since you already own the hardware.

[TxPhotoShooter]

Originally Posted by ken74

Are you under contract? If so, you may be able to get out of it without paying a termination fee due to the change of the contract you signed originally. If you're going month to month, then you have the choice to leave and use the phones you currently have on another provider. You'll need to check which basebands your phones work on and call ATT or TMO, if CDMA, then Verizon/Sprint. So you can go month to month since you already own the hardware.

Ken,

When I purchased the iPads, the salesman told me that one of the best aspects of choosing Virgin Mobile is that there are no contracts. All the service is purchased on a month to month basis. He stated that with the 3G iPads, we would have to take out a contract for service with AT&T for yearly service. Thus the costs were going to be much higher than the purchase when needed plan with Virgin Mobile. But I have since found out that the AT&T plans for iPads are $25 for 2.5G per month and you can add if you are going over for the month. Also, the plans do renew every month but you can cancel and then renew later when you need the service. The salesman did not inform me of this.

The kicker for me is that I spent nearly $400 for the MiFi hardware which may not be used now if my sons opt not to spend the higher costs for Virgin Mobile service. They can still use the iPads where ever there is a wifi spot. But since they don't have the 3G iPad if they want service outside of wifi then they will have to use some type of MiFi connection. So the only loss may be for the purchase of the hardware if they opt not to use Virgin Mobile's MiFi setup.

I just wonder if all of this was purposely misrepresented so Best Buy could get rid of their Virgin Mobile hotspot hardware.

[KenJulio]

Sales people at bestbuy aren't the sharpest tools in the shed and they'll blow smoke up ones butt to make a sale.

If you don't want the data plan id suggest taking your loss now on the mifi. Better mifi devices are and will be coming out, with 3/4g and better battery life. Also smartphones are coming with a hotspot feature now so having a separate device such as a mifi would not be needed.

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

[lsosa]

all the phone services will only let you have 5gigs if you only have 3G in your area 4G is unlimited, virgin is the only one that slow down after 5Gig the other will shut down. I have try all them and I only can get 3G in my area of the hill country outside of San Antonio