Gearlog talked with Verizon HQ to clarify the much debated extra $15 for Exchange confusion. The official response was good.

The bottom line is this: For personal accounts, the 30$ data plan includes everything – including Exchange. Business accounts have $45 data plans – and they too include Exchange.

So there you have it. The price depends solely on whether or not you’ve got a personal or a business account. There’s no “extra” for Exchange. The confusion could be blamed on a couple things. For example, the wording in the last quote we saw:

“Verizon offers three data plans for Droid customers: $30 month on top of your voice plan’s rate for non-Exchange usage, $45 per month on top of your voice plan’s rate for Exchange usage, and $50 per month total cost for a data-only plan (whether or not you use it to access Exchange). Verizon spokeswoman Brenda Raney notes that the requirement to get the $45 “smartphone plan” for corporate e-mail usage applies to any smartphone, such as the BlackBerry — not just to the Droid. “The Droid is primarily a consumer phone,” Raney adds.”

..could perhaps (clearly?) be taken a couple different ways. It’s still confusing to re-read that. I think the word “corporate” should have been used more and “exchange usage/non-exchange usage” less.

So big thanks go out to GearLog for getting the facts straight from VZW HQ on this one.

[Thanks resno!]