leave verizon for sprint???

I live in Fairfield County too. Roaming is not going to be a big issue here. However, I would check coverage in your area. On the whole, Sprint coverage is pretty good, but there are towns where the Planing & Zoning folks have not allowed any further build out of cell towers.

 

Sprint is usually pretty lenient with roaming. You need to go several consecutive months with roaming over 50% of your minute usage or 800+ minutes (whichever is less) before Sprint MAYBE does anything about it. There have been some people who have roamed excessively for years and haven't heard a peep out of Sprint. There have also been people who have roamed excessively for a few months and Sprint decided to do something about it. In the best case, nothing will happen to you and you'll enjoy Sprint's (roaming) service for years to come. In the worst case, Sprint will give you notice that they are terminating your contract due to excessive roaming within XX number of days... in which case you are free to cancel/port your number ETF-free and go to any other carrier of your choice (like Verizon) and get NEW customer pricing on any phone you want (like the HTC Droid Incredible, or the Samsung Galaxy S). Either way, IMHO it's worth the "risk" to try Sprint out.

If you really do love Sprint's service and don't want to risk beign terminated for roaming from home or work, call up Sprint's Account Services and complain about the coverage in your area. They will most likely offer to give you an Airave (microcell) for FREE (with monthly charges waived). Any calls/data transmission to/from the Airave counts as on Sprint's network, so you will significantly cut down your roaming that way.

And yes, while roaming you will use your Anytime Minutes (M-F 7am-7pm) and Unlimited N&W Minutes (M-F 7pm-7am, Sa & Su). Unlimited "Any Mobile, Anytime" & Unlimited M2M, or any other "unlimited" voice feature does NOT work if you are roaming off Sprint's network. (If you are on the $99 Simply Everything Plan (ie: Unlimited EVERYTHING), then you get unlmited EVERYTHING regardless if you're roaming or not... however the 50% / 800 minutes roaming policy still applies to you.)



EDIT: If you are joining Sprint as a NEW customer, why not save some money? Click the EPRP link in my signature to find out how to save ~15% on your monthly bill and get more minutes! (If your wife gets a corporate discount with Sprint for >15%, then it may be better to just get a regular "Everything" plan and use her discount... EPRP plans are NOT eligible to have additional discounts.)