I Just Want to Buy a Phone!

Verizon sure makes it confusing for someone who wants to upgrade their phone.

I have an existing line of service and phone, under contract. I’m considering going the route of some sort of data service, either BlackBerry or Treo or such. According to the Verizon website, if I’m a new customer I can get a BlackBerry 7230 for $150 with a 2-year contract. If I log in as an existing customer, and try to upgrade to this phone, it’ll cost me $450. Huh?

Attempting to find an answer, I trekked down to the local Verizon store. As usual, the store was packed, with at least one loudly screaming customer, pissed about something. After waiting about half an hour, I talked to someone clueless, who said that the web pricing and retail pricing are different, and that it would cost me $300 to do what was $150 on the web…

I came home and fired off an email to Verizon’s online customer service. I wonder if they’ll give me yet a third answer. I just want to upgrade my phone, and I don’t feel that as an existing customer I should pay three times what a new customer would pay.