Verizon Adjusts Edge Plan, Now More Similar to AT&Ts Next

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Verizon Wireless has made a change to its Edge device-upgrade plan for new customers that reduces the number of months you have to pay off your new smartphone or tablet from 24 to 20.

The old plan let you make equal payments for 24 months, giving you the option to upgrade once you’d been an Edge participant for at least a month had paid off half the phone. You now must pay off 60 percent of it before you can upgrade, Droid Life noted. Rival AT&T has similar requirements for its Next device-upgrade plan.

Obviously, your monthly payment goes up now that you have just 20 months to pay off your new device.

It seems that the carriers can afford to tighten up their rules on these plans. Jefferies analysts recently said that wireless customers are finding these programs to be quite appealing.

“We now forecast [approximately] 45 percent uptake of national carrier device sales in 2014, up from just 30 percent three months ago,” they said, as quoted by Fierce Wireless.

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