The way the Wi-Fi setting "Ask to Join Networks" operates needs to be reconsidered

It appears that Apple does not prioritize the issue of undesirable cellular data consumption. If my iPhone X (and my wife's iPhone 11) is not connected to Wi-Fi, but cellular data is turned on and connected to the cellular network, then the Wi-Fi setting "Ask to Join Networks" is inactive or disabled.

I believe this should be changed, so that the choice of "Notify" or "Ask" for "Ask to Join Networks" is effective regardless whether cellular data is turned on or off. For users that are paying for unlimited cellular data plans, this option can simply be set to "Off."

Comments and personal experiences will be welcome, especially if this results in a change.

Background:

I changed to a new mobile provider paying $14 per gigabyte, with a 2GB minimum and an additional $14 each additional GB. However, two months in a row with 2.04 GB used, I ended up paying the additional $14, so I have become extremely sensitive to whether I am connected to available guest networks when away from home which are typically available at restaurants, department stores, medical facilities, etc.

However, because I still sometimes I forget to check availability, I am now also very aware that the Wi-Fi settings option "Ask to Join Networks" is NOT working as expected. Regardless whether it is set to Notify or Ask, if I don't pay attention, there is no reminder to get me to check for availability.

After spending a week with Apple Support trying to make it work without success, even with my iPhone wiped back to New Phone settings, I believe I finally figured out the problem.

With cellular data turned off, and no Wi-Fi network selected, opening Safari brings up the message “Cellular Data is Turned Off.  Turn on cellular data or use Wi-Fi to access data," even when a guest network is available. Then, as soon as I turn on cellular data -- or if it was already turned on when walking into that location -- I am by default using cellular data with Safari. The only way a guest network is selected is if I remember to look for one and manually select it.

The ONE exception to the above was on a single occasion last week, when it DID notify me while I was at a restaurant in St. Augustine. But it disappeared before I made a selection from the notification list and I couldn't get it to reappear, causing me to manually look for and select the guest network.

I'd been puzzling over that anomaly until today when I came to the conclusion that -- although cellular data was turned on -- the cellular signal was borderline. I now assume my iPhone initially failed to establish a cellular network connection long enough to offer the available guest Wi-Fi, but then dropped that offer when the cellular network crossed the minimum threshold. Changing the criteria for the "Ask to Join Networks" to be effective regardless whether cellular data is turned on or off would solve the main issue as well as anomalies such as this one.