Last summer, Teresa Dixon Murray at the Cleveland Plain Dealer did a great job highlighting a phantom $1.99 fee Verizon Wireless was hitting consumers with -- even when phones were off, phone batteries were dead, Internet access was blocked, or the phones couldn't go online. Many of you at the time complained about the fee as well. If you remember, Verizon told the paper they'd fix the problem, the charges were "erroneous" and that users would be getting full refunds.

Apparently, we were the only people who read that story, because in November David Pogue at the New York Times wrote the exact same story complaining about the rogue fee -- and this time it generated all manner of controversy. Pogue's story did add an extra wrinkle, given it contained information from a Verizon employee stating that the entire thing was essentially a ruse designed to generate millions in additional revenue, and Verizon wasn't doing a thing to stop it:Especially if nobody is paying attention except the Cleveland Plain Dealer and Teresa Dixon Murray, right? After all, ripping people off is the second most loved American pastime behind baseball, and some consider it an inalienable right. But whereas the Dealer story didn't get much attention, the Times story did -- and the FCC has now started sniffing around as a result. According to the FCC, they've sent this letter to Verizon (pdf) asking the company to explain the phantom fee.

"In light of a recent New York Times article suggesting that customers may be charged $1.99 for inadvertently accessing Verizon Wireless’s Mobile Web, we would like to better understand the terms and conditions of such access," says the FCC. The letter goes on to ask pointed questions about the nature of the fee, why it's necessary, and why users still incur the fee when they ask online services to be entirely blocked. On the heels of a new bill taking aim at excessive ETFs, the FCC letter also asks Verizon why the carrier felt it necessary to bump their ETF for smartphones from $175 to $350.

The ETF question should be easy enough for Verizon lawyers to answer, given that in addition to making money, Verizon's interested in preventing people from turning around and selling high-end subsidized smartphones like the Droid on eBay. That at least makes some semblance of sense, even if many people think high ETFs are anti-competitive and a rip off. It's Verizon's answer to the $1.99 fee that should be considerably more interesting. There's really only a few possibilities:

•Malicious: The phantom $1.99 fee was created to screw consumers from the start. That would certainly not be new for the baby bells, who've generated countless billions in bogus fees and other surcharges over the last thirty years. Disgusting.

•Incompetent and malicious: The phantom $1.99 fee is an ongoing billing systems mistake by Verizon (which certainly wouldn't be unique to the company), but Verizon became aware of it and did nothing to stop it. Or worse, as Pogue's insider claims, they encouraged support to prevent customers from resolving it to avoid losing the revenue it generates. Disgusting and sad.

•Just incompetent: The phantom $1.99 fee was a multi-year mistake by Verizon, impacting thousands (if not millions) of customers for several years, and a Cleveland consumer beat reporter noticed it before they did. Verizon somehow managed to deploy fiber to the home to 40% of their user footprint in just a few years, connects millions of users and businesses across a myriad of conduits daily, and operates the most sophisticated lobbying apparatus in American industry -- but couldn't identify or fix a significant consumer billing issue. Just sad, but in a unique and disgusting way.

Surely Verizon has a really interesting answer to why they were generating millions in additional revenue off what appears to be either a gigantic screw up, a huge con, or both. Should we start a pool on Verizon's justification for the fee? To "improve the customer experience?" Perhaps to "maintain the integrity of the network?" To resolve congestion? Protect the environment? This ought to be good.