By Karen
Verizon’s Executive Support Escalation Team determined that my mother’s phone bill is correct. She just wasn’t able to calculate any combination of the convoluted, cryptic list of charges to arrive at the $99.99 she was quoted.
The total is about $10 more a month than she expected to pay, but that’s because they never tell you up-front you’ll be hit hard with taxes and miscellaneous fees.
Here’s more good news for Verizon: My mother has decided not to send her complaint to the State Corporation Commission. She feels she’s wasted enough time on this and won’t rewrite her letter to reflect that her bill’s confusing format led her to believe she was being overcharged.
She also declined Verizon’s offer to send someone out to tutor her on their e-mail program. From the way she describes it, it’s as bad as their billing and she’s better off with AT&T.
It’s unfortunate that every Verizon customer service rep isn’t a member of their Executive Support Escalation Team, diligent as a stalker and fully empowered to find answers and solve problems.
On the other hand, this morning I had reason to call Verizon Customer Service myself. I did it like any other schmuck, not using my new-found contacts in high places. When I had my FIOS phone service installed a few months ago, I clearly stated that I did not want Call Waiting. They seemed to understand me, and repeated the order back to verify it.
Guess what? I got Call Waiting.
I spent 2 pointless minutes explaining my request to a computer, then another 16 minutes on hold. A pleasant rep named Diane finally answered and, in my excitement, I accidentally cut her off.
I was standing there listening to the dial tone in despair and disbelief when Diane miraculously came back on the line. She quickly verified that, yes, the weird beeps I’d been hearing were Call Waiting, she disabled it, and then double-checked by calling me. She even offered to transfer me to Billing, but my phone plan requires paying for features I don’t want, so that wasn’t necessary.
All in all, except for the long hold time, it was perfect customer service. Thank you, Diane.
But trying to get a fraudulent charge off my Verizon bill was another story. That’s coming up next, along with advice on how to keep it from happening to you.
