Verizon is not doubling the fee to protect itself from broken contracts. If that were the case, they would simply demand that the subsidized portion gets paid b

Verizon is not doubling the fee to protect itself from broken contracts. If that were the case, they would simply demand that the subsidized portion gets paid back. They are trying to lock customers in and penalize people for switching. This will be a short-term win. In the long term, it may reduce new signups. If you have a huge subscriber base and limited competition you can afford to milk them for all they are worth. It's still a crappy thing to do. The $1.99 charge is flat out unethical. I used my cable box to rent a movie once, but it didn't download properly and getting my $2.99 or whatever credited back into my account was such a pain that I never did it again. It made me question my whole relationship with them. If my carrier charges me $1.99 for a mistaken button press that I cannot disable, I would do everything in my power to drop them.