That didn’t take long. Just hours after Sprint countered AT&T Mobility’s “double data” move, Verizon Wireless threw its hat in the ring with a data bucket increase of its own.
The carrier said beginning Oct. 2, and running through the end of the month, customers on its More Everything plans would be able to sign up for an increase of their shared data bucket on plans of at least 12 gigabytes, pre-increase. The 12 GB plan will now provide 15 GB for the same $110; the 16 GB plan grows to 30 GB for the same $130; while the 20, 30, 40 and 50 GB plans all double in size at their same pre-doubling price points.
The data bucket increases also apply to business accounts, with Verizon Wireless stating those current buckets of between 20 GB and 50 GB will be doubled for the same price.
Customers are still charged a per-line access fee each month to tap into the data bucket, with the fee dependant on the device and how the customer is paying for that device. All data buckets include unlimited domestic calling and messaging.
The move could prove compelling for Verizon Wireless customers as the carrier recently rolled out its voice over LTE service, which transmits voice traffic over the carrier’s LTE network. Current pricing for the service, which also allows for video calls, dings customers for both voice calling minutes as well as a data session, though the carrier did note that a video call will automatically hand off to a known Wi-Fi access point, thus saving on cellular data charges. Verizon Wireless said a one-minute video call will use between six and eight megabytes of data.
T-Mobile US has so far stayed away from the shared data bucket offers, preferring instead to offer each line of service on a family plan its own allotment of data. The carrier does offer unlimited access to streaming radio services that do not consume data from a customer’s data bucket.
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