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Verizon Throttle October

For the better part of the last three years Verizon Wireless has been segueing customers away from unlimited data plans. Those plans are no longer available however a system malfunction earlier this year allows some unlimited customers to renew. Customers with unlimited data who never formerly renewed their contracts and have simply continued month to month, still technically have “unlimited data”.

Now Verizon is cracking down on those customers and will begin throttling their data on October 1st.

Beginning October 1st Verizon will use their Network Optimization practices on cell tower sites experiencing heavy demand.  TheVerge.com suggests that major cities like Manhattan or Chicago are more likely to be affected by this news rather than more rural areas.  However it’s worthy to note that small to medium sized cities and towns, that have more customers with less towers will also be affected.

There have been a bunch of rumors reported that Verizon will be throttling all data on those towers however the company says that’s not the case.

TheVerge.com reports that these customers, and only these customers for now, will be affected:

  • You’re using a 4G LTE smartphone on an unlimited data plan.
  • Your current data usage falls within the top 5 percent of all Verizon users. This ceiling will almost certainly fluctuate in the future. As of March, hitting 4.7GB in a single month was enough to put you over it.
  • You’re a month-to-month customer. Most people probably fall into this category, but if you’ve somehow managed to renew your plan for another year or two, you don’t need to worry about throttling. Of course, renewing an unlimited plan isn’t supposed to be technically possible. But where there’s a will there’s a way, and users have occasionally discovered loopholes that allow re-upping with unlimited data.

Verizon Wireless left this policy fairly open ended. We would reason to believe that you will only be affected on towers that are overcrowded however how overcrowded is defined has not been reported.

“The vast majority of data customers will not see any impact from Verizon Wireless’ Network Optimization policy, and will be able to browse the Internet, stream music and videos, upload pictures and send emails as they always have, ” Verizon told theverge.com on Friday afternoon.