Apparently there are FCC regulations that prevent companies from busting out the retention offers if you’ve already decided to defect to another provider, and three cable companies are bringing charges against Verizon for allegedly violating these regulations.

The complaint states that in violation of FCC rules, Verizon used its knowledge of switching customers — through requests to have their phone numbers moved or “ported” to the new provider — to ply them with “price incentives and gift cards” to stay with Verizon.

“While some customers rebuffed Verizon’s inducements to stay while the port requests were pending, thousands of customers accepted Verizon’s offers, after which Verizon cancelled their orders for [cable VoIP],” the MSOs’ complaint states.

Here’s Verizon’s response:

“This filing should be seen for what it is — another cable company effort to block consumer choice as competition heats up,” said Verizon spokesman David Fish. “Verizon’s retention marketing is lawful, does not interfere with number porting and, most important, it allows consumers to choose a better alternative. It’s hard to believe that cable would attempt to block consumers from receiving information about additional services and lower prices.”

So in other words, port your number to a cable company and watch the deals roll in.

Operators File FCC Complaint Against Verizon Over VoIP [Multichannel]

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