Open letter to Verizon Wireless Management and Customer No-Services

Question

After more than 10 years as a customer of Verizon Wireless, I have recently encountered several situations that have caused me to begin the process of changing my service provider to another company. Verizon has "zero" loyalty or appreciation of its existing customers; they have poor, and in one particular case, rude customer no-service representatives and policies.
I purchased a new smart phone for my college daughter. Of course, activation of this new phone required the purchase of a data plan, even though she doesn't need or intend to use data services. (That's fine; I was aware of  this cost even though I believe it to be over-priced). In addition, they also required a $30 fee for signing a new contract. Seriously? Are you kidding me? A fee for the "privilege" of signing a contract with the big, powerful, arrogant Verizon? I don't want a contract in the first place; it is Verizon that wants the contract. They should pay me for signing a contract. I could understand a fee for a new account setup (not really, but it makes a little sense) but a fee for an existing multi-line, long-time customer where the paperwork is nothing more than a mere mouse click of  the "I Agree" button?
So, the daughter gets her new phone with 24 months of data (for the low, low price of 25 months.... yea right). We take her old phone, which she has had for several years, and decide to use it on another of the lines in our family plan because it has a qwerty keyboard. Now, I learn that I have to sign up for a data plan to use this old phone on a different line. This phone has been in service for several years with no data plan but now I have to have a data plan to use it?  What the **** ??? I only wanted to use the phone for voice calls and a few texts. I have no need for data. This phone, an ENV3, is not well suited for data services anyway. (No, I won't be using this old phone after all.)
Companies such as yours dream up  junk fees; this one amounts to $1.25 per month additional revenue. They do this as a way of increasing revenue while advertising a lower price, ie advertise $30.00 per month but actually charge $31.25. I suppose they all pat themselves on the back and start counting all the new-found money. The management is so stupid and arrogant that they do not realize what the long-term impact could be. In this particular case, the end result shall be the net loss of $250.00 per month in revenue. I know that you don't care; that is painfully obvious and clear.
Well Mr. Verizon, you may consider this to be my official letter of resignation. Consider me gone, done, history. I don't need you, your arrogance, or your over-priced services. I currently pay nearly $250/mo to your company for six phone lines, four of which are "very lightly" used for calls and and a few text only. Personally, on my line,  I do nothing but make and/or receive an average of  two  3-minute calls per week. I put up with a lot of crap making my money; I do not have to tolerate any when spending it. I WILL be taking ALL my business elsewhere. Four of my lines are currently month-to-month with no contract. I will be moving these to another provider in the coming week. The remaining ones will be moved upon expiration of their respective contracts.
Cheers

Answer 1

Verizon has no obligation to respect your "loyalty." They do, however, have an obligatory fiduciary duty to their investors, hence the "upgrade" fees, "line access" fees, "regulatory recovery" fees, data plan "repuirements", and data caps, none of which are intended to buy YOU anything. They are assessed primarily to provide profits to them and dividends to their investors, along with a source of capital expenditure for their network expansion whose sole purpose is to attract more customers to provide more revenue streams to meet their aforementioned fiduciary duty to serve their executives and investors ever greater profits and dividends. And in this country, that is ALL this wireless game is about. EVERYTHING else, be it customer service, value of service, loyalty or anything else, is secondary. 
And you think other carriers are any different? Nope. They all are in this for the exact same game, however they choose to play it, plan for plan, fee for fee. Sure, details differ, some plans might look more appealing and for some, prudent shopping around might even net some nominal cost savings, but all in all, they pretty much charge the same fees and require the same data plans, because that's where the big bucks are, and one way or another you will pay them or you will do without (which might be a blessing in disguise).
I personally don't like this any more than you do, and I would favor strong federal regulatory oversight much as they have in Europe Latin America and Asia, along with homogenized network infrastructure which stimulates competition by allowing easy interoperability of phones and devices irrespective of carrier, but I fear it will be a cold day in hell before we ever see the likes of that here. According Republican thinking, that's just not the "American Way."