Verizon Wireless CEO Daniel Mead has defended the company’s plan to extend its “network optimization” policy, which slows down heavy 3G users at cell sites during times of congestion, to LTE subscribers starting on October 1, Telecompaper.com reported on Aug 5, 2014. His discussion with reporters follows FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler recently writing to the operator to object to the fact that only customers on unlimited data plans would be affected.

Echoing a reply seen by Cnet sent by Verizon senior vice-president of regulatory affairs, Kathleen Grillo, Mead said the policy targets unlimited data customers because they are most often those who use the most bandwidth and that the throttling would not occur very often. Grillo said in her letter that customers on usage-based plans have a financial incentive to moderate their usage.

In response to Wheeler’s accusation that Verizon was using a network management policy to push customers to drop unlimited plans in favor of more lucrative usage-based ones, Mead said this was not the case. Unlimited data plans are still available, but do not come with subsidized handsets. Most customers have moved to the other plans.