So I have Verizon wireless as my carrier and my EnV touch cell phone is up for an upgrade. So the other day i go into Best Buy (I have best buy's insurance on my Verizon phone because best buy insurance is better) and I start looking at phones that i may like. I like the HTC droid eris and the Motorola droid. Then i see this sign that says "requires data package of 29.99 or higher! I ask the person working and he says ya that the newthing Verizon is doing. They put all their phones into three classes; 3G Smart phones, 3G Multimedia and Feature Phones. phones in the 3G Smartphone category require a $29.99 monthly charge in addition to what you already pay for your plan, 3G multimedia phones require an additional $9.99 charge and feature phones done require an additional charge. The charge allows you to surf the web basically for free with the $29.99 charge, the $9.99  charge gets you a limited amount of data usage.

These charges are mandatory for the first 3 months and after that you have   to cancel the charges and not have to pay them. Personally my bill is 50 a month so if I want the HTC droid eris it will end up costing me $80 per month for as long as i want the access. that's an extra $360 dollars per year...even if i only use it for the 3 months that's an extra 90 bucks, that's almost two normal payments for me...i think this is ridiculous and should be eliminated. Verizon is great but this is stupid. 30 a month isn't cheap, hell, 10 a month isn't cheap. Makes me never want to get a new phone, anybody have any comments to this? or suggestions?

Verizon Wireless Link