rip_sketches
join:2002-05-25
Dallas, GA
|  [Verizon] Double Billing ?
This will probably come off as an rant but getting near my wits end here.
2 Months back the wife and I went and ordered Verizon Cellphones and service via Verizon Website. We had been looking in the stores but on the website we could get Buy one get one free on a Samsung phone set. We placed our order online and website said it would email within 24 hours to confirm the order. Nearly 5 days had went by and with no confirmation we called to see if everything went through.
This is, of course, where everything goes wrong. We are told that Online ordering is down/not working properly and that we can order the same deal on the phones via the operator at that moment. We opt for this and several times tell Verizon Operator to make sure the online order will be canceled since we are ordering on the phone. She assures us the online order is cancled and that the phones she sets up are being sent, the others will not. The operator even overnights our new phones to make up for our wait with the online process.
New phones arrive, they are the ones the operator sold us with those numbers and accounts. We set them up everything is working. Several days later, now 10 days after i make the online order, i get an email confirmation of that order, with phone numbers and arrival time. At this point we CALL verizon back and are told twice during that phone call that the first order is canceled the emails were only part of the malfunctioning online process. We are told that if by some chance the phones arrive we can send them back with the RMA label they include in the package, no problem, everything taken care of. And of course 2 days later the phones arrive at our door.
So we call Verizon again, tell them we got the phones, tell them we are sending back the phones. Ask them AGAIN to please cancel the online order as we had already ordered and recieved another set of their phones. They tell us, again, no problem, order is already canceled in their system. We mail the 2nd box of phones back.
About 2 weeks later, we get the bill, the first bill for the first phones, ordered online. We call Verizon, tell them the story, it is turning into one. They then want to know where their phones are, tells us they never recieved them. Wife has to go online, enter FedEx tracking number, get name of the Verizon Employee and Time it was signed for, then call Verizon back. She tells the Phone Operator everything who then verifies this for us, but tells us the order was never canceled. We then cancel this order, again again.
Phone bill then arrived for the phones we are using and it was paid...
But now, a month later, I am sitting here looking at the 2nd bill for the online phones, they are showing we DIDN'T pay our first bill, and that it is now due with the 2nd one. I am kinda pissed at this point over it. Don't know who we need to speak to get this taken care of. I am going to try to call this afternoon and get it taken care of but am having little faith in the process now. |
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KevNYC
Premium
join:2002-03-31
Seattle, WA | Wow, well first try calling Verizon again and if they don't help try filing a complaint with the BBB. |
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Andrew J
Premium
join:2001-11-09
Lancaster, PA
clubs: | reply to rip_sketches
I just contacted the only person I know at Verizon about this. If he can offer any help I'll let you know.
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If you give a little they give a lot. |
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anjarp
join:2004-08-17
Murfreesboro, TN | reply to rip_sketches
if you want, i can see if i can fix this for you. i work for vzw, and would be happy to assist. i just hope you live in the midwest (the billing system i have access too). |
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rip_sketches
join:2002-05-25
Dallas, GA
| reply to rip_sketches
Well, finally, maybe some closure.
Sorry to wait until this morning to follow up.
But here goes:
Sat with wife as she spent over an hour on the phone with billing support last night. She got transferred to no less than 4 people who in the end couldn't or wouldn't help us.
Every person she spoke to required the entire story, see first post, but then told us they could not help us. The final person she was speaking with told us we were wholly responsible for the charges on the first set "online" ordering of phones. Kept telling us that the time between when they shipped and got the phones back we would have to pay for as well as a cancellation fee. It takes me wife over an hour to get flustered over such a call, it takes me about 5 minutes, hence why i cannot do the actual call, and at this point my wife was ILL. No one we spoke with would accept that the online set was never meant to be sent.
We will not mention how every rep we spoke with at that point didn't have one iota of information on the phones being sent back. And that multiple times my wife had to give FedEx tracking number, name of signee, and time of delievery back to Verizon.
It was also all my wife could do to convince the last person she spoke with to NOT cancel both sets, the lady seemed more than ready to cancel both orders at once and charge us for them.
My wife had to argue incessantly with her to get through to her and she told my wife it would be resolved and promptly hung up. But Wife and I had a feeling that it wasn't resolved so Wife called again, this time changing tactics. Wife began asking first CSR she spoke with for higher level support, that we have had a continuing issue.
This first CSR (on this 2nd call) was Benny from Georgia call center. He seemed to have ALL information at hand, for once. He also noted that the last lady from the first call did NOT resolve the issue for us. HE said she made notations about our refusal of payment and didn't show any attempt at cancellation. He even said himself it showed on his end our return of the phones and that they were never activated, nor out of verizons hands for more than 4 days.
Benny promised that our issue with verizon should never return again. Thank goodness. He even gave us his CSR number and extension number if this problem returned unresloved. He seems to be the only helpful person out of the entire night last night, also he was the only person willing to give out their name. All others gave initals. My wife has kept an entire record of who she talked to and names(initals) and CSR numbers where they would give them.
For the several posters here willing to help, thankyou, this is the reason i posted to BBR with our issue. Hoping that if everything wasn't resolved that we might get some help here. So i will keep this topic bookmarked for some time just in case. But i am hoping that everything is resolved at this point. |
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PhoenixDown
-- Wants FIOS
Premium
join:2003-06-08
Fresh Meadows, NY
clubs:  | reply to rip_sketches
I'm glad you were finally able to get it resolved. I know how frustrating it can be to go thru the customer service run around.
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Final Fantasy |
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Andrew J
Premium
join:2001-11-09
Lancaster, PA
clubs:
 ·Comcast
 ·Vonage
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| reply to rip_sketches
I'm glad you got it fixed. In the news at the front page here a few weeks ago was a story about awful cellular customer service. The main story was a women on Verizon whose husband had died. Verizon claimed she owed his $175 for early termination of service! She said this was not a trivial thing, since he's now dead. Verizon said she had to find someone else to take over his contract or pony up the dough. Since death was not on the list of approved reasons for early termination of services!
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If you give a little they give a lot. |
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rip_sketches
join:2002-05-25
Dallas, GA
| reply to rip_sketches
I'm only hoping like hell its all fixed - over and done with. Its not enough that a person becomes a customer of anything anymore but when something goes wrong the consumer/customer have to go to great lengths to PROVE we are in the right, even when it was someone at Verizon who dropped the ball.
With our calls last night every CSR was in "I'm here to help you mode" until they see we have that outstanding bill. At which point their demeanor changes to a "I cannot help you until you offer to pay this bill" attitude. So its back telling the story over and over until they admit they cannot help us and transfer us to another department which starts this process all over again. Or the CSR gives up and just finally agrees to tell us everything is solved when its not.
I'm still upset that this is the 5th time we have had to address this problem with Verizon. Up until i got the 2nd bill for phones i didn't have i would have recommended Verizon service to anyone, but now i feel differently. All this over an online order that didn't confirm in a timely manner (10 days), and a CSR who tells us it probably won't go through and that she can cancel that first order and make a new one for us and expedite it. |
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Bchinch00
Brian
Premium
join:2001-01-13
U.S.A.
clubs: | reply to rip_sketches
Wow, that is an amazing story. I have been using verizon for over 3 years and have called them a couple times, but they were always helpfull. Glad you got it sorted out. |
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mbruno
join:2003-07-03
Fruitland, MD
·Comcast
| reply to Andrew J
First of all let me just say I am in a similar boat on the phone issues. I just can't believe that customers have to go through that much Sh#t just to get something taken care of. AS I state earlier in this post I may be in a similar situation. I say it that way because I think I have learned a lesson about upgrading with Verizon. I'm sure everybody knows about the New every 2 plan well I decided to use it and also bring the wife in on my plan to save her a little $$$ as well. My first mistake is being impatention and not waiting for the Motorola V710 phone to come out from the Verizon wireless store, instead I had to buy it from Radio Shack which I didn't know at the time I couldn't use my $100 upgrade towards a new phone. So I bought it and had it for a couple of days and made three calls on it but then decided to take it back because it was worth the $350 I paided for it.
So I take it back and got no hassle from Radio Shack but when it came time to put the number and the old contract back to the original phone, Verizon tells the Radio Shack Rep. I can't because the old service plan doesn't exist any more. Also that he being the Rep. would have to fax paper work to her to prove I returned the phone. At this time I am getting a little pissed at the whole thing. The rep is the CSR of Verizon he has never heard of such a thing before and he has done hundreds of these in the past. She continues to argue with him mean while I still have no Phone service. So the RS rep just said OK he will do it and he ask the CSR how long it would be before she changes stuff because I need service the response was "WHEN SHE GETS TO IT".
So he calls back and gets someone else and explain the whole thing and the CSR this time tells the RS rep the person before she didn't know what she was doing and that he will take care of it. But I would have to wait until tomorrow before the old contract would work because the previous Verizon Rep. has screwed my account by changing the price plan three times which means they can't even touch it until the billing cycle is up. WAY TO GO VERIZON, So I left the store and before leaving the RS rep told me to call back the next day just to make sure everything went through so I did and I was given different news this time. I was told I was no longer on a contract any more but I would still get the upgrade price if I decide to buy a phone.
At this point I have been told three different dates of when my contract ends who knows which one is right. So I wait until the 10th of august and go to the Verizon store hoping that I can buy the new V710 early and I get this Corp. management guy and ask for the phone he looks me dead in the face and said he has no clue what I am talking about. I looked right back at him and said you have to be "shitting me". I told him that radio shack has their branded phone and it's plaster every where on the internet and he still said he didn't know what I was talking about. The funny thing is that the Sales rep behind him is whispering "TOMORROW" very softly behind his back.
So I go in there and I wait and finally get this phone and sure enough the Stupid rep the Radio shack person was talking to on the 29th of July at Verizon on the phone strikes again. Since it has been more then three price changes on my billing cycle I couldn't add my wife but had to get a separate contract for her on my plan and then wait until the 22nd of this month and have to go in to Verizon to get them to fix it so at this point I have no clue what my bill is going to be but one thing I am sure is that I know that I am going to have to fight them every step of the way. It's a good thing I saved every piece of paper and names and times of who I talked too. I'm sure it may not do any good because in the end Verizon is the big Giant and we are the little ppl.
One more thing sorry if I rambled on but I needed to get this out. At this point I am not likeing verizon very much. |
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rip_sketches
join:2002-05-25
Dallas, GA
| reply to rip_sketches
Hate to bring this up again but Verizon has now turned over the account on the phones we told them to never send us, the phones that we returned 24 hours after recieving them to collections.
If anyone here can help with this problem, please read through my previous posts for exact nature, and please PM me via BBR or send email to d_otwell@bellsouth.net
This is ridiculous. |
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mistakenID
join:2000-11-07
Salt Lake City, UT
·Comcast Formerly ..
| reply to rip_sketches
There used to be an email address on the Verizon website where the mail went to one of the higher mucky mucks office. I had used it to solve a problem I had with billing and it was taken care of almost immediatly and I was even given a $25 credit for the trouble.
I've looked around the site and can't find the persons email address but someone on BBR may be able to provide an address. I sure wish I had saved it.
With Verizon you have to get the right person to solve a problem it seems. The first CSR I spoke to was so rude and I got so pissed that I had to give the phone to my wife to keep from exploding listening to the stupidity of this person. |
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bigEZee
@mindspring.com
| reply to rip_sketches
Cellular phone bill evaluator
Here is an excel utility that may be of service to others with cellular billing problems.
If you have access to an electronic version of you cellular phone bill from your supplier (this one is designed for Verizon), you can paste the call data into the green region of the spreadsheet.
The spreadsheet evaluates your phone bill for "dropped calls" or for potential double billing of calls. For example, if your bill indicates that you called Aunt Martha 3 times in a row for one minute each, or for two minutes each. Did you actually make those calls, or did the billing system somehow repeatedly charge you for one call? If this is multiplied over 50 pages of calls, there might be a substantial overbilling.
It requires microsoft excel (this is not an endorsement for this software), and it is provided only as a means to help in scanning through large bills for odd calls. It is not guaranteed.
Feel free to distribute. Please do not modify.
- DB |
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Greg_Z
Premium
join:2001-08-08
Springfield, IL
·Comcast
| In all actuallity bigEZee, you cannot evaluate dropped calls by just going through a monthly billing statement. The utility that the cellular companies use goes directly into what the system records as a dropped call, not the billing.
When you look at dropped calls that a customer has, it will show if it was due to actually dropping the handset on the ground and the battery came loose, if the customer just lost power due to dead battery, if a band hand-off happened while traveling through a area while driving, if a customer went into a building and the connection dies, if customer was inside a structure and the tower was not able to keep the connection live, and the SN ratio just went to far to the point the connection is not able to stay live.
There are number of factors, and going through a billing and saying that every one minute call was a dropped call will not work in getting credit. Pretty much every call I make is within on the average of 1-2min's.
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One man's customer loyalty is another man's miguided arrogance. |
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