yeah you can. at least with verizon they usually go through. worst case scenario is you have to have the account holder of the account you're porting from call our port center to confirm it.

anyway, about your issue..

if him and his mom already have verizon service, there will be no porting going on anyway. i dont have enough background on the situation to really tell, and a lot of people are easily confused about exactly what 'being out of contract' and 'eligible for an upgrade (new customer price)', 'eligible for new every two (aka up to $100 credit off the new customer price) upgrade' and so on.

if he's currently a secondary line on his dad's family share plan (aka paying 9.99 for the line per month and hence not being eligible for the 'new every two' upgrade cause it has to be $35/month or higher to qualify) he's only eligible to get the new customer price, so it wouldn't make any sense for him to have his dad cancel that line so that he can start a new one. he'd actually be paying more cause he'd have to pay the activation fee.

the solution would be what's called an assumption of liability, where he just changes the number from his dad's name to his own, and can get a new phone at the upgrade (new customer) price (same price as if he stayed on as a secondary line on dads acct) without having to pay an activation fee.

if mom also is on verizon and under dads name and he wants to add her to his plan, he could do the same process for moms number at the same time he does his, or at any other time.

i think the reason you think you'll get a deeper discount for starting a new line/phone/number under your name is because best buy's prices are cheaper for new customers than for eligible upgrades, unlike the corporate stores.. you can probably get a corporate verizon store to match best buy's new customer price for your upgrade. they'll usually do pretty much anything if you threaten to go elsewhere. if they're being gay about it use the fact that you're out of contract and can disconnect without penalty to your advantage.

 

mom is also on verizon. My dad has a seperate verizon plan for him (through work), and then mom and I decided to get our own. So Dad opened up an account with me as the primary number and mom as the add-on.

We arent necessarily buying from bestbuy, I just wanted to get a feel for the phones and to have someone answer some questions. Bestbuy would seem the easiest way though, its closest and I could walk out with the phones instead of having verizon ship them out.

Ill go to a corporate store tomorrow and see what they have to say, maybe I can get them to throw in a free something or whatnot to keep me away from bestbuy.

Basically what we wanna do is have me open my own account and have mom as my add-a-line. We both wanna keep our phone numbers (her more than I) if we can, and it would be cool to get the new customer price since I never "technically" had my "own" account. Would that work?

The only reason my mom is latching on with me is because we arent sure what dads company is gonna do this year with his phone, they might switch to cingular. Could mom possibly go month to month until they figure that out and if he switches to cingular, I can add her to my plan at any time, correct?

Thanks Brad and everyone for your assistance.

 

okay. here's what you do.

since dad has you on his work acct on a seperate family plan for you and mom, you're just gonna do an assumption of liability from dads name to yours.

since you're the primary on the current family share plan, based on what you told me, you should be eligible for the new customer price, PLUS up to $100 off that price, PLUS the mail-in rebate (usually $50 unless buying a PDA/blackberry).

mom, since she's the secondary line, qualifies for the new customer price and the mail-in rebate, or any of the 'get one free' deals if they're doing any buy one get one free deals. i think right now its BOGO 8300s and buy ANY, get up to 3 5300s.

since you're the primary and qualify for the new every two ($100) credit, you'll get the razr max for 99.99 plus a $50 mail in rebate. the new cust price is 199. you'll prolly be better off buying it at the corporate store, assuming that the info you told me is correct.

long story short you'll make out better financially if you do the assumption instead of cancelling dads lines and starting 2 new ones, and buy the phone at a corporate store, cause nobody else can give you the $100 credit.

now, in order to move the numbers from dads name to yours you need to be at a corporate store and either

a) have dad call cust svc and have them remark that he's giving you verbal authorization to assume liability for those lines
OR b) go into the store with you when you wanna do this.

ALSO- from a comission-earning sales rep point of view, do them a favor and upgrade your phones while still on dad's account FIRST. then, once you're done, go to the customer servce dept and do the assumption. reason for this is basically because doing the assumption renews the contract, and thats what the sales reps get paid for. by default, customer service reps will do an assumption under the house account, meaning nobody will get paid for it. so let the sales rep get you your new phones (and contract renewal) first, and then have the assumption done. they'll thank you for knowing whats up.

 

thank you much! Im gonna print this out and take it with me as well just so I can have a reference..

thanks!

 

glad i could help, man.

 

i just got a samsung blackjack. i at least like this samsung. i hated my damn motorola.

 

samsung