Verizon iPhone 5 customer upgrading to iPhone 6 Plus on Sep 12 2014, here's some useful tips

Sep 12 2014 3:55am Eastern Time Update:
Despite what I was told yesterday (see article below), tonight, talking to 800-256-4646, was told cannot help me, other than charging full retail for the 6 iPhone 6 Plus phones. My family will have to wait to pre-order until Sep 26th (7 days before Oct 3rd eligibility date). No pro-rated ETF options, apparently. This miscommunication is unfortunate._

As far as the math, for an iPhone 6 Plus 64GB pre-order today, it'd be $849 (full retail). Pre-ordering it on Sep 26th, it'll be $399, with a $200 gift certificate credited to the account if my used iPhone 5 is turned in by mail, or brought into a Verizon store.

I'm not sure if I'd have the same issue with ETF at an Apple Store, and the online Apple store is not back up yet.

Original article below:

In my family, our iPhone 5 phones are not all really eligible for upgrade until October 3rd, 2014. So I did some reasearch and made a few calls, then sent the below-forwarded (slightly edited) heads-up email, to my family plan members. Thought other folks in the US might benefit from my findings, and save yourselves from some time on-hold, since I couldn't find most of this information online, anywhere.

From: Paul Braren
Sent: Thursday, September 11, 2014 9:50 AM
To: family
Subject: FW: I called Verizon Wireless today, here's what they told me

I got clarification from Verizon Customer Support today at 800-922-0204.

I had 3 questions, not being sure if they could answer any of them, before 3:01am tonight (they could):

1) Can we upgrade those 6 iPhone 5 phones to iPhone 6 Plus 64GB?
Yes, because they’re less than 30 days away from end of contract, but won’t be able to do that order on web site, will need to talk to a human (#s below)

2) Can we upgrade that LG Revere, without waiting until 1/26/2015?
No, wait until Dec 26, to ask for that upgrade.

3) How long do we have to ship the old phones in for trade-in value? (about $250 for 64GB, about $225 for 32GB)

Turns out Verizon recycling/trade-in is available for in-person customers at retail, or via their website www.trade-in.vzw.com, many options that’ll work out fine, even through Oct 11th if need be.

The value of our phones is locked in to end of September, $225 per iPhone 5 32GB in good, working condition.

So now we get into tonight:

Verizon Telesales will be available at 3:01 eastern Fri Sep 12 2014 (tonight) at:
800-256-4646

Verizon Customer Service # opens at 5:00am eastern Fri Sep 12 2014 (tonight) at:
800-922-0204

Won’t know the estimated date of arrival, until I get the order for 6 phones on order
(limited supply for day of release Sep 19 2014).

I also talked to:
Verizon Tech Support
866-221-4096

to ask about the posibility of activating without a nano sim. Turns out no, you can’t. You simply leave the sim that comes in the iPhone 6 Plus phones, activate them, then ship my activated phone to me in Germany (where I'll be using one of local nano sims in my iPhone 5, that I should be able to just move over to the iPhone 6).

See also

I’ll be working in Germany from September 18th to October 18th, 2014
Posted by Paul Braren on Mon Sep 8th, 2014

Moving iPhone 4 from AT&T to iPhone 5 on Verizon? Have I got the article for you!
Posted by Paul Braren on Wed Oct 3rd, 2012