Verizon To Reprimand, Fire Employees Who Try To Save Customers Money

[Joanne98]

Internal Verizon memos reveal that the wireless ogre is eager to reprimand or fire customer service representatives who proactively recommend blocking access to the company's overpriced data services. The company is also going to be stingier about issuing back credits to customers who spot unnecessary and unwanted services littering their monthly bills. The New York Times asked Verizon to explain itself, and the answer wasn't all that surprising.

According to the Times' tipster:

“Effective this past month, all CSRs
•Web Access Blocks
•Data Blocks
•Premium SMS blocking
•Application download blocking
•Vcast Music or Vcast Video download blocks
Essentially, we are to upsell customers on the $9.99 25mb/month or $29.99 unlimited packages for customers. Customers are not to be credited for charges unless they ask for the credit. And in cases such as data or premium SMS, where the occurrences may have gone months without the consumer noticing, only an initial credit can be issued.
”
http://consumerist.com/2010/06/is-verizon-wireless-making-it-harder-to-avoid-charges.html

[jp11]

1. They suck at just about everything customer related.

I was glad to ditch them way back when.

[Dennis Donovan]

4. Their customer website is a nightmare to navigate...

It took me an hr just to find where to download the software for my air card...:eyes:

[hobbit709]

2. Tracfone

No fuss no muss. I don't text or download shit on my phone. I make calls, receive calls. Average cost is $10/mo. Works anywhere in the country.

[Lasher]

3. You didn't get all of your second paragraph copied.

Effective this past month, all CSRs [customer-service reps} were versed on the usage of blocks. A new policy has gone into effect regarding how to handle Escalated Calls regarding data charges. Now, a representative can be reprimanded and even terminated for proactively offering to block any of the following:

[hadrons]

5. scummy company ... I'm glad I stiffed them out $400

[boobooday]

6. They just did this to my daughter -- sold her a plan

Then added a bunch of bullshit charges to her first bill, making it DOUBLE what they had quoted. Then when she called they gave her this crock about pro-rated this and that. Essentially, she could have avoided about $80 if she would have waited a couple of days to begin her account.

But of course the salesperson would have been fired for telling her that . . .

[ejpoeta]

9. when we got new phones the lady told bob to wait til the next billing cycle to set up the data plan

i hate to think she would get in trouble for doing that!! that kind of customer service would make us want to stay with a company. it's a shame that they would actually frown upon much less reprimand or fire someone for that. shame on verizon.

[boobooday]

11. It's pretty stupid -- especially to create a bad feeling for a young customer

Who probably has many decades of cell phone service ahead of her.

[gvstn]

7. This has been going on forever

My mother worked for the phone company 40 years ago and had to quit. She said she was told to sell people services they didn't need. The poorest and least educated were the ones the phone company targeted. (I don't know what services were offered back then other than tone dialing LOL)

She was told it didn't matter if the customer needed the service as long as they agreed to take it. Sad.

[localroger]

8. Well their pure data service is pretty good

I ditched my landline recently since AT&T can't seem to keep the cable working and went with a Verizon MiFi card (uses the 3G signal to form a Wifi hotspot). I started service a few days before the billing cycle turnover and they just started my bill on the next cycle and applied my usage for those few leading days to that month's cap. There aren't any value-added services to use (the MiFi is technically a phone with a phone number, but since it has no user interface you can't actually use it to make a phone call or run apps or do any of the other silly download stuff). Last month when my usage topped 4/5 of the cap they called me to make sure I knew how to monitor my usage so I wouldn't go over (I did know, hey I paid for 5 gigabytes and I'm gonna use 5 gigabytes TYVM). But that's exactly the opposite of what this piece suggests; they contacted me to make sure I knew I was going to get hit with a serious overcharge before I actually got hit.

[lostnfound]

10. I wish there were ONE data/phone company that were the good guys

I like banking at a credit union and I like buying insurance from Progressive. Where can I get my Internet/phone service from?

[SocialistLez]

12. I'm still pissed

for the past 6 months or so AT&T has been overcharging me. I've spent about $120 more than necessary and all I got back was a $25 credit.

Too bad they have the best cell coverage where I live, Verizon is too expensive and sucks and Sprint is only $10 cheaper a month. Big whooptee doo.

[Odin2005]

13. Corporate sociopathy! YUCK!