Verizon: We Can't Set Up Your Account "Because Your Name Has Shit In It"
Meet Dr. Herman I. Libshitz, a retired radiologist and potential Verizon customer who would like DSL. Sadly, Dr. Libshitz was informed that he could not use his name in his email address or as his user name because it has "shit" in it.
He tried his best to escalate the complaint with Verizon, but had little luck. First, he called the help line:
"We called their help line, and got a wonderful young man in the Philippines who told us:
" 'We can't install it because your name has - in it.' "
I asked the doctor how I was going to print that. He said, "Just say it's a word contained in Libshitz."
He had no luck with a supervisor, so he called the billing disputes number and reached another supervisor who promised to investigate and have someone contact him because " the only person who could help was in Tampa, and that man would have to call India to get them to change the computer code." No one called back.
Finally, he got a letter informing him that he could not use his name as a username because it didn't comply with Verizon's policy.
It took calls from the Philadelphia Inquirer to get Verizon to deal with Dr. Libshitz and his "questionable" name, and that's what bothers him. He told the Inquirer that what he wants "is for these people at least to stand at attention to explain themselves. I don't know if you've ever tried to get to Verizon. . . . You cannot get to them. They are insulated from things like this." Unless you work for a newspaper, that is.
Here's Verizon's official response:
"As a general rule (since 2005) Verizon doesn't allow questionable language in e-mail addresses, but we can, and do, make exceptions based on reasonable requests. The one from Dr. and Mrs. Libshitz certainly is reasonable and we regret the inconvenience and frustration they've been caused."
Daniel Rubin: When your name gets turned against you [Philadelphia Inquirer] (Thanks, Will!)
(Photo: Maulleigh )
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Comments:
No biggie, just choose something else. Hell, I have a short but difficult-to-spell last name so I prefer a truncated email address.
I wonder if he has an Xbox Live account..?
Poor guy, that sad thing is probably the lowest leve of phone people probably could have changed this, they were probably to lazy or too smug to do so
U-oh. My 4th grade teacher, Mrs. Hinnershitz, is going to have trouble with Verizon.
BTW, it was awesome to have a teacher named that. In a singsong voice: Goooood moooorning Missus HinnerSHITZ!!!
I had a vietnemese friend in middle school and his last name was Fuk. I wonder if he can get a Verizon account?
With a name like Smuckers...seriously if I had a name like that I would have changed it a long time ago.
They obviously take this issue "very seriously". Verizon FTW!
misleading sensationalistic headline.
makes it seem like they wouldn't install an internet connection for him. I'm surprised it got overridden in the end at all, could have easily been software in place that wouldn't allow anyone to actually create the username.
It sounds like it was a poorly written algorithm with no easy override. The programmer should have at least thought there might be a case of someone with a banned word in their name...weird.
Pick a different username, then inform Verizon after a month that you don't pay bills with shit on the mailing label. He has to settle for a different email address than he likes, but it's free so everyone's happy.
I knew a guy in grad school named Long Wang. I bet Verizon wouldn't approve of that user name either.
Lmao at the Headline Meg!
Funny, when I call Comcast customer service, an American takes the call, in a local call center º.0
@Blinden: Not misleading at all. They can't set up his account. That's what the headline says. And it's a ridiculous reason.
Awesome. Just out of curiosity, does anyone use their ISP e-mail anymore? I have something like 12 free e-mail addresses through verizon, which I've never used since I have my own domain and gmail.
Just wondering if anyone else uses it.
Obviously people do, because I get the occasional @comcast.net or @optonline.com or whatever email from someone, but yeah, why would you want to? Gmail, yahoo, and other web-based emails are free and portable and will probably stick around longer than Craptastic ISP Company X.
What -real- company uses a profanity filter in their accounting? Sounds more like Blizzard and their !@#$# filter in World of Warcraft. JEEZE
Reminds me of AOL back in the early/mid 90's when they decided to add a few words to their filters to improve their porn filtering. One of the ones they added was "breast". They conveniently forgot that they had an entire forum on AOL at the time devoted to survivors of breast cancer. Suddenly people could only post that they were survivors of "hooter cancer" or other colorful phrases. Needless to say AOL backpedaled on that decision very quickly once the publicity started hitting.
The man should be able to use his name, however something else caught my eye, "If I can't use my own name, I'm going to stay with my AT&T dial-up," the doctor said. "The hell with them." How would he apply for Verizon DSL if he has AT@T Dial up?
He could change his name to Lipstikz, I suppose.
Nicholas Cage on SNL as Asswipe Jones.
Pronounced Ahhsweepay.
Regardless that shows a great deal of cultral insensitivity on Verizons part. They need to deal better
This happened to me, too...with SBC. B/c my last name has the word "mail" in it.
Because his verizon phone was capable of calling an AT&T number I would assume, you aren't tied to your phone company for dial-up service.
Why oh why do people keep stupid names like this? And of course hes a doctor a very smart one! I always hate it when people call in with the name Weiner and and they always say its pronounced ... Why-NER. Its like no you don't fool me.....your last name is a hot dog.
It's like the time internet filters prevented the residents of top English city sCUNThorpe (the Pittsburgh of North Lincolnshire) from telling people where they lived on emails.
I hate dealing with companies that have their systems locked down so that the front line person can't make a simple common sense decision. Just goes to show they don't trust their own employees and don't want to pay to hire quality people or train them.
Of course, if I was paying a bunch of minimum wage call center script readers, I probably wouldn't trust them either.
I think it's super unfair and rude of you to blame someone for "keeping" their family name. To call his name stupid is highly unsensitive of you.
Oops, I meant INsensitive.
@Pithlit: It's misleading because the problem was with his desired username not his given name. Verizon would give an account to Ivanna Fuckalot as long as her username was cutiepie09. This is a stupid policy, but if it were me I would have changed my username to something else and just gotten a gmail account to save myself the headache. If he wants to spend his time complaining to the papers about this, that's his choice, it seems to have worked.
Another clbuttic mistake.
Weiner is a German name and it is pronounced WHY-ner. Wiener however is pronounced Wee-ner, like the hot dog or male anatomy.
I wonder if he said on the phone:
"THIS IS BULLSHITZ!"
There's a company in Indiana called Assman, named after the owner. Doubt they'll be able to get business DSL.
BTW, it's pronounced az'-man
Crap. I might have problem with my last name Verizoncansukmyballz.
This is exactly why my friend Richie Cockprick does not have Verizon.
My office is currently working with an office move specialist as we prepare to relocate to a new building. She told us that she just had to take the word "specialist" out of her emails because it is being blocked by some spam filters because it contains the word "cialis". Sometimes they just don't think spam filters through all the way.
"He told the Inquirer that what he wants "is for these people at least to stand at attention to explain themselves."
That perfectly sums up my feeling about 99% of the consumer hassles I read about or deal with. It's practically poetry.
BUT WE MUST PROTECT THE CHILDREN!!! WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!??
Looks like Ralph Lauren (born Ralph Lifshitz) had the right idea.
Absolutely ridiculous... there isn't even a need for a filter like this on new accounts. Obviously if the name is bullshit it's not going to even make it past the credit checks.
And what of the poor teacher from Southpark. She cannot have Verizon DSL?
What about all the poor Takeshitas of the world? Hell, even Panasonic's parent company (Matsushita) has, um, that word in it.
Do you HAVE to have your name as an email addy? I've never used my name as my username. However, even if his name did have "questionable content" in it, they shouldn't have refused to install DSL because of it.
@superqueen23: About 10 years ago I was working with a search engine startup and one of the projects I got involved in was their porn filter. It didn't take us long to figure out that certain phrases should NEVER be used to identify potential porn. One of our first attempts that lasted all of about 30 seconds was 'XXX', which we very quickly realized would flag anything involving Super Bowl 30, many pages with copyrights, etc.
I have a co-worker who's last name is Knipple. Pronounced with a silent K.
My friend Irfan Butt will probably have to go with Crapcast (second worst company in America (TM)).
Ha! Just change your name! (Joking, while as a kid, he was probably picked on, too. Sadly Verizon acts as a kindergarten kid:)