US Cellular

kberyldial

Well-Known Member
Mar 20, 2006
1,265
58
48
I know this has been talked about and I DID do a search, so no need to skewer me on the "another cell phone plan thread."

Family has Verizon - wife hell bent on switching to US Cellular. If I could get some pros and cons it would be appreciated. Thanks.
 
if things are like they were earlier this year; the billing will still be all messed up.
 
I have Verzion for personal and US Cellular for work...my experience is that both have similar coverage in most areas and US Cellular has terrible customer service. I will say that depending where you live, US Cellular does seem to do a bit better job of getting coverage to more obscure areas like in Southwest Iowa. Most parts of Iowa you will see virtually no difference between the two. Verizon does seem to have better customer service and they historically usually have better phones (may not be so true anymore with fewer exclusives).
 
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I know this has been talked about and I DID do a search, so no need to skewer me on the "another cell phone plan thread."

Family has Verizon - wife hell bent on switching to US Cellular. If I could get some pros and cons it would be appreciated. Thanks.

PRO:
* Great coverage around midwest
* OK customer service despite having WAY too few workers in each store
* Every now and then you can get locked in on a good plan
* They are way cooler about not "locking down" features of phones like some *other* carriers

CON:
* HORRIBLE phone selection unless you want an iPhone or Samsung Galaxy
* Most workers have no idea on the phones they are selling you (I know there are good ones out there who can actually us the phone they are selling you, but they are few and far between). Most just push the latest galaxy phone no matter what you tell them you are looking for (or if you already know what phone you want)
 
Moved out to the sticks, so had to switch from Sprint. Was either US Cellular or Verizon. Went with USC.

Pros:
- coverage is great where I am, which is BFE
- customer service folks are American. Dumb as stumps, but overall nice people who hold English as their primary language

Cons:
- billing has been a nightmare since I switched. Sprint was spot on, every time. USC sent me 4 bills in a span of 5 days this month. I haven't had to pay anything more than what was agreed upon in the contract, but it's frustrating to see something everyday and not really know if you have to do anything or not
- customer service folks are dumb as stumps (oh, I said that already). At least they speak english
 
US Cellular is the only provider for me. No dropped calls, great coverage, no billing errors, and great customer service at the store on South Duff in Ames.
 
I never had a dropped call for 8 years with US Cellular in Chicago. Then for some reason they forced all their Chicago customers to quit US Cellular. I have no idea why.
 
We have Verizon and love it, the only con is that we get lousy coverage at Iowa State games, not sure why Verizon wont put up a tower in Ames, like the one US Cellular has at the games.
 
I had US Cellular for years. Coverage was good enough, just was too expensive for my liking.

If you don't mind Sprints coverage, I would highly recommend Republic Wireless as they are the cheapest out there and use Sprints network
 
I never had a dropped call for 8 years with US Cellular in Chicago. Then for some reason they forced all their Chicago customers to quit US Cellular. I have no idea why.

They sold their Chicago and St. Louis markets. Unfortunately all those customers had to switch
 
I never had a dropped call for 8 years with US Cellular in Chicago. Then for some reason they forced all their Chicago customers to quit US Cellular. I have no idea why.


sold their Chicago market to Sprint.
 
I've had US Cell about 20 years. My wife was on Verizon, but we switched her to US Cellular a year ago.

Very rare to have dropped calls in Iowa. I've had very few issues with them, but my wife doesn't like the phone she got. Their selection does look Spartan relative to Verizon.

I've got a decent rate on a family plan, but will check both out again when my plan renews next summer. I don't really see much difference between the two.
 
Does anyone know if you can take unlocked phones to USC? That's one of my big issues with Verizon is that there are a lot of really good phones out there (Sony for example) that you can take to AT&T and they'll work fine on their network. But since Verizon is still using CDMA most won't work unless Verizon sells them to you. I guess I can't remember seeing UScellular on the lists of carriers that unlocked phones work with or don't work with.
 
Does anyone know if you can take unlocked phones to USC? That's one of my big issues with Verizon is that there are a lot of really good phones out there (Sony for example) that you can take to AT&T and they'll work fine on their network. But since Verizon is still using CDMA most won't work unless Verizon sells them to you. I guess I can't remember seeing UScellular on the lists of carriers that unlocked phones work with or don't work with.

I don't think they do.
 
Also been with US Cellular for 20 years and about the only time I had problems with them was this year when they added ******* apple to the mix and had to reprogram all the towers and their services to apples requirements. Service is back to where it should be now I think, but I'll never buy a crapple because of what they did to service for about 3 months......

Ya, I'm a little miffed but I'll get over it.......hopefully.

Service has been good otherwise, but I agree their customer service can suck at times but I haven't had to use them much with the exception of above problem. I like the Galaxy phones and might try the LG phone this next time so I don't have to much of an issue with their selection.

US Cellular is quite a bit cheaper than verizon according to what I've heard. The latest plan change I made was to get 10 gigs of data for $120 and then if your phone is off contract then that line is $10 / month. If you are still within 2 years of a new phone it costs $40 / month. I told them they must be wanting to get away from selling phones. Go to some of the shops that sell used phones and buy a S4 for $200, most of the time that phone is new condition and pay $10 / month vs paying $99-$199 for a new phone and then pay $40 / month for 2 years. Pay $200 plus another $720 over the course of 2 years sounds ridiculous to me now. I bought my S4 on craigslist, as well as one for the wife and my two daughters had to have Iphones 5c's I bought second hand, which thank goodness for them I bought both of them prior to me knowing that Apple screwed up my service for 3 months but boycotting them now.....;)).

I have been to Wyoming, Colorado, Las Vegas, Minnesota, Missouri, Tennessee and have had great service for the most part.
 
Does anyone know if you can take unlocked phones to USC? That's one of my big issues with Verizon is that there are a lot of really good phones out there (Sony for example) that you can take to AT&T and they'll work fine on their network. But since Verizon is still using CDMA most won't work unless Verizon sells them to you. I guess I can't remember seeing UScellular on the lists of carriers that unlocked phones work with or don't work with.


Depends on the phone, apparently. You'd have to call and ask.
 

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