Visible Is Also Offering Compensation for This Week’s Verizon Power Outages.
Following an unexpected nationwide outage on Wednesday, Verizon attempted to save face yesterday by announcing a $20 discount on all myVerizon accounts. Now, its budget subsidiary, Visible, is also trying to make amends.
As spotted by 9to5Google , Visible is sending its customers SMS messages with the following content, promising a $5 discount on their next bill as an apology for the power outage:
We let you down yesterday, and for that, we apologize. We’re offering you a $5 discount on your next month of service, valid after January 16th when you pay online with a credit card. This discount isn’t compensation for the incident, but it’s a way to express our appreciation for your time and show how important it is to us. If you’re still experiencing connection issues, please restart your device (turn it off and then back on).
The amount may be smaller, but it seems a bit more convenient to receive the compensation, as it can apparently be applied to your bill (though I can’t promise anything for those using automatic billing). Like Verizon’s offer, it doesn’t differentiate between those affected by the outage and those not affected, according to Reddit users .
Other Visible subscribers on Reddit have noted that they haven’t yet received the SMS, though I suspect this is more due to slow rollout than anything else, as users who haven’t received the SMS and contacted support confirmed they were also offered a $5 bonus. I’ve contacted Visible to confirm whether the $5 bonus applies to everyone and will update this post once I hear back (I also asked if it will apply to automatic payments).
As for why the payout is so much smaller, it’s likely due to the difference in service prices between Verizon and Visible. Verizon stated that its $20 payout is based on the price for “several days of service,” and frankly, those same days cost much less with Visible.
Although Visible uses the same network as Verizon, it differentiates itself by giving its users lower connection priority, allowing it to offer unlimited data plans starting at $20 per month . Prices range up to $33 per month, but essentially, $5 offers much more benefit on this low-cost network, meaning it’s a similar value to paying $20 for a full Verizon plan.
Whether this is a fair price for an unexpected day of connection interruptions is up to you to decide.