I managed to slip in under the wire and get a Verizon unlimited data plan before they stopped offering them. I’ve been using my 3G phone as a hotspot, and it’s been ok for when I’ve been away from “real” internet, but I’m wondering about getting more with an LTE hotspot device.
Isn’t it a new device with a new contract? I doubt Verizon would roll it into your current “grandfathered” unlimited plan. It’d be a distinct contract, or if they would incorporate it into your current contract, they’re probably reset Terms & Conditions and impose a current plan on it.
Current Verizon customer. No other special knowledge, other than knowing what kind of greedy controlling bastards they can be sometimes.
I think gnoitall has it right. In recent support call with Verizon (they’d hosed the demarc mapping in my building), I spoke with a [gasp] knowledgeable support person. She indicated that they use MAC filtering to restrict accessibility.
Not that you couldn’t spoof the MAC, but that would probably violate the ToS.
If you have a current Verizon 4G LTE account, hotspotting is free and Verizion cannot charge you extra for it. Apparently the spectrum Version uses came with a stipulation that they cannot charge customers a fee for accessing it. However, if all you have is 3G as others have stated, you will need a 4G LTE and that will change your TOS.
This is incorrect. I have a Verizon account and my phone is an HTC Thunderbolt and works on their 4G LTE network. I have a grandfathered unlimited data plan for $30 a month. To activate the hotspot, they charge me an additional $30 a month for unlimited data (or maybe it’s 2G, I’d have to double check). Both the network access by the phone for data and as a hotspot access the 4G and there they most definitely can and do charge customer a fee for accessing it.
The grandfathered data plans are specific to a device. Multiple reps have told me that if I upgrade my phone I will lose my unlimited data plan. However, the new “share everything” plan is actually cheaper for me for the amount of data we use, and has unlimited voice and texts, so I’m going to switch anyway.
As for Cardinal’s hotspot
Do I need anything else?* No*
Will Verizon ever know the difference and try to charge me another fee for using data? Of course they’ll know the difference. I don’t see how you can possibly use it on their network without activating it with an account. They know exactly what devices are connecting. There’s no way the network will see this device and think that it’s your 3G phone.
Is there anything that is unusual about this idea that I might not have anticipated? See #2.
My company uses a Verizon hotspot as a connection solution at a federal customer site where we cannot connect to their network. It works pretty well when we get good reception, but that’s spotty. If your phone gets good reception in a location, a hotspot should also.
I have tried three apps for this and each one has said that they don’t work with HTC phones (mine’s a Thunderbolt). Apparently some feature is locked. I suppose I could root it but I’m not sure how reliably I could do it or whether I could fix it like that.
I just recently called them about this. They would not enable the verizon tethering app built into the phone without the $20 a month fee. There are other tethering apps in the market. FoxFi being one of them. I could not get it to work correctly on my phone. So I rooted my phone and and using WiFi Tether for Root users.
Does this apply to any other carriers? I have T-mobile and was quite happily tethering my unlimited data plan (unlimited=up to 5 gigs at 4g speeds) to use the internet on my computer. The bandwidth was quite sufficient to play my mmorpg from 1-5 days at a time when my roommate slacked on paying our internet bill. But the last time I tried to tether, I kept getting redirected to a T-mobile paywall. I figured they were doing MAC filtering… I could spoof it, but they’d find out when I tethered again due to increased usage. Since it’s a pay-as-you-go plan, I’m not in a contract. But I imagine they could still drop me as a customer for abusing the system, and I’d rather not test that.
It has to do with the conditions put upon the Spectrum that Verizon is using for LTE. The other carriers are using spectrum acquired at earlier auctions before the FTC mandated new rules for how the spectrum can be used.