Verizon Wireless sent out an email that the $10 autopay discount is getting reduced to $5 in the coming month (unless you switch to a more expensive plan). With the $10 discount, most people preferred to do the required ACH payment and save the $10. Now that the discount is only $5, some might prefer to pay full price with a Chase INK Cash credit card which earns 5x on wireless.
Hat tip to reader Brad
I use the Chase Freedom Flex to pay my Verizon bill, to get the cell phone protection (insurance). In my mind, I was effectively paying $10 per month (cost of not using auto pay) for cell phone insurance, which was still cheaper than Verizon’s own coverage, which, last I checked, was $18 ish. Now my effective cost is $60 per year. Well worth it, in my opinion.
I switched from Verizon to USMobile. I won’t look back. Same network, lower prices, far better support. I look forward to better Federal regulation of these gravy-sucking pigs.
For people that aren’t heavy mobile data users, there’s no reason to pay full price for branded service when it would be a lot cheaper from an MVNO of the same network that just resells it.
Agreed, especially with Verizon. US Mobile offers prioritized access to their network on the cheap. Wife and I are on a $26/mo plan which includes two lines and a shared 6GB pool of data. We are on wifi most of the time, and enough places offer free wifi that we don’t really ever hit the limit.
At this point I can’t imagine going back to one of the major networks.
A good clarification point to add to the article is that it appears that this latest autopay discount change only applies to lines on older plans (while the autopay discount on lines that are on one of the current plans is not affected).
The moment they demanded that you couldn’t prepay with a card and the WHOLE payment had to be via ACH/Debit was the official point that I left them for T-Mobile.
Now T-Mobile is in the process of doing the same thing. Fuck these fucking assholes – 100% this shit needs to be clamped down on. Credit Card companies should also be going after them for circumventing their contracts that they not charge people fees for using a credit card. This is just a reversal of that where they don’t give you a discount instead of charging a fee.
The workaround for Verizon (though it can be a headache to do) is to go to a Verizon store, buy a Verizon GC with a credit card, and then apply said GC to your balance. This will still result in the ACH autopay discount (for the leftover cents).
Try and find a store to sell you a gift card. I used to buy them all the time.
Now these lazy assholes in the store tell you that they don’t have any. F*** Verizon.
I have used gift cards before for mobile payments and I had to manually use them to pay the bill. How do you schedule auto pay using the gift cards?
The workaround is to pay your bill in full at a Verizon store kiosk or with a representative at the store. Use a credit card with cell phone protection if you have one. This won’t affect your auto pay discount, and there’s no need to buy gift cards.
Do you need to leave any small amount for auto-pay?
Yup, got this email recently. I plan on switching mine to my Amex SimplyCash @ 5%. $5 I’ll make more than $5
I got my bill yesterday, and I am still receiving the $10 discount.
“While we continue to offer Auto Pay benefits, your $10/line discount will be reduced to $5/mo.* and your bill will increase starting on or after 10.10.2024.”
This is what the email says,
“Verizon Wireless sent out an email that the $10 autopay discount is getting reduced to $5 in the coming month”
And, this is what the OP says.
It seems that this latest announcement only applies to older plans (while the autopay discount on lines that are on one of the current plans is not affected).
I called and was told that Welcome Unlimited(cheapest plan)will not go up. Only older legacy plans like Play More will go up. Any of the current family of plans will remain $10 off. I had one line of Play More out of my 7 lines,. It gives me Apple Music for free. I got the notification due to that one line. My other 6 lines are Welcome Unlimited and won’t change. Who knows if the overseas rep knew what she was talking about. LOL
Excerpt from email: While we continue to offer Auto Pay benefits, your $10/line discount will be reduced to $5/mo. and your bill will increase starting on or after 10.10.2024. However, your current plan price and benefits will remain unchanged. You also have the option of moving to myPlan, where you’ll receive an Auto Pay discount of $10/mo for every line you switch.
MyPlan is the current family of plans so this confirms what the rep told me.
Hmm, I’m using their Verizon visa to pay my bill on Start Unlimited and didn’t receive any notice about the autopay discount reduction
Not sure if this works with Verizon, but Xfinity has a similar discount for paying via ACH. But I prepay the balance with a credit card and usually have a few hundred dollar credit (thanks to Chase and AMEX offers). I still get the discount even though no money ever comes from my ACH.
I do the same with Xfinity. But I’ve seen Verizon’s terms explicitly say that using another payment method will cause you to lose the discount. I suspect Verizon gift cards could be the answer: buy gift card with credit card and use that to pay your bill.
Gift cards do work, but are often a pain to obtain, and if you order online they sometimes come unactivated and it’s a royal pain to straighten out. Also, a lot of the store employees don’t know how to sell them. Technically, another option is to overpay the balance (up to $500 negative) with a credit card. You’ll only lose the autopay discount in the month (after) you make the credit card payment. But you’ll keep the auto payment discount in all the subsequent months you’re spending down the negative balance.
I had that issue with some physical gift cards I got online several years ago. With difficulty, I eventually got it straightened out, but it seems like I wasn’t the only one. I haven’t had reason to buy any since then.
Good idea about making a big credit card payment in one billing cycle!