Verizon Snatches Away Divorced Man's Unlimited Broadband Plan
They say that for people going through a divorce it can feel like you're losing half of yourself. As if it that wasn't bad enough, Verizon Wireless has taken away William's unlimited broadband plan on the account he used to share with his wife.
William writes:
I have actually been pretty happy Verizon Wireless until very recently.
I have one regular cell phone line with Verizon, and one of those nice little usb broadband modems. I have had both since about 2004. The great thing was that I had the unlimited broadband plan on my modem. They do not offer it anymore so I was proud of being able to keep my unlimited broadband plan.
Earlier this year, my wife and I got divorced. Among the thousands of matters to attend to, was to split our Verizon account into his and hers. I called up Verizon and explained that I needed to remove her from the account and have the account only in my name.
The rep said this was no problem, and it was quick to do. I asked him specifically to ensure there was no changes to account, and if the broadband account would remain the same. He ensured me that this would be the case, and even commented on how cool it was that I had the Unlimited plan. He told me I needed to make sure I kept it. Wise words.
I kept getting bills in the expected amount so I did not verify further at that point. This month I did read my bill, and I notice that my broadband plan has changed from Unlimited as expected to their new 5GB plan. This was clearly an error so I call up VZW to have them correct the error. I spoke at that time to rep number. 322590. She assured me that she would put in a request to have my account updated back to the grandfathered plan and I would get a call back the next day.
3 days passed and I received no notification so I called VZW back. This time I spoke to rep 319729, who was a supervisor she said.
She looked at my account, and said that VZW had refused to put the unlimited plan back on my account, and there was nothing they could do. I requested that because they had failed to provide me with what I was contractually entitled to, that they should release me from the termination charges on the account and allow me to close the account.
Rep 319729 said that it was impossible for VZW to give me the plan and I wanted, and it was impossible for Verizon to release me from my early termination. Now they are charging me $59.99 per/month for a service I did not sign up for, and do not want.
Rep 319729 said that there was a website that listed the terms and conditions that apply when VZW makes a change to the account, and it was my duty to read this mythical piece to understand what they were allowed to do, when they make changes to the account. Rep 319729 did not say what the Url for this document was.
What can I do? They took advantage of me, in a very trying time in my life, and they refuse to fix it, and they even rub my face in it, with this mythical website I am supposed to have read before calling to change my account.
Not cool, Verizon.
(Photo: daysofthundr46)
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Comments:
EECB, and if they don't give you satisfaction, terminate your contract and dare them to charge you for it. If they charge you for it, hit small claims court.
EECB FTW. If that fails, then DDOS on VZW DNS.
@wagenejm: Bingo. Simply tell them that you are canceling due to a material change in the contract (switching to a new plan is obviously that). You did not request this change and therefore it was they who made this change.
He will need to become intimately familiar with the terms of service for any court case or fight he gets into. But good luck :)
I would suggest that the OP signed the Unlimited plan contract with them. The OP didn't sign a contract for 5GB. Verizon has canceled the OP's contract, then instated a new contract with his name on it, and claims it's the same contract. From where I'm sitting, it's not the same contract.
I'd also point out that if you call a business on the phone, and their automated answering system doesn't tell you to read the terms & conditions on a website, and the agent you speak to doesn't either, but you come to a verbal agreement, odds are the website terms don't apply to the deal. You can't hand someone a blank page, claim it's a contract, then fill in terms later after they write their name on it. Well, you can, but you can't enforce a contract that way, since a contract is an agreement between two (or more) parties, not simply a posted list of rules (though such a list can be referenced in a real contract).
I would keep escalating until it is resolved. It sounds more like he got a supervisor who couldn't be bothered to actually help correct an error on Verizon's part (either dropping the unlimited plan or having a representative who did not understand that this would happen).
William, EECB them without hesitation.
That was really terrible of you Verizon. Allowing this man to keep his unlimited plan and effectively improving your PR in this case will most certainly have a much more positive effect on your quarterly profits than keeping him on his current plan will. Remember, thousands upon thousands of people will be reading this story. It's not worth it.
@Difdi: You are a bit wrong on the latter part about the terms of service. Part of contract law is "reasonably understood" concept. He had to "reasonably understand" that there was more to the contract than was negotiated over the phone. Not to mention I bet if you went and looked at Verizon bills, there is some reference to the terms of service somewhere.
Trust me, things like that would be ripped apart by their lawyers. Now, your first part is exactly what he should hit on. I had a contract. You changed it. For me to be bound by the new contract, I have to ratify it.
He could sue for specific performance to get his unlimited plan back... but I wonder if the courts would allow for that.
@wagenejm: He could threaten to leave, but where will he go to get "Unlimited" data on a cellular data card. Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile all have a 5Gig cap on data plans, so while you may leave just to spite Verizon, you are really in no better situation if you often go over the 5GB cap.
@TuxthePenguin: I think his only recourse if they choose not to put the Unlimited contract back in place is to cancel and force their hand to either waive the ETF or stick to their guns and charge him, to which he could likely get the courts to throw out.
His state's AG might even lend a helping hand, there.
My bank did the same thing to me during my divorce. I had a joint account with free billpay among other perks no longer offered for free by the bank. They said there was no way to just remove my wife's name from the account and they had to open a new account in my name. Here's the catch, since they no longer offered the same account types as I had before they could not give me those services. I was stuck and forced to lose all of my perks.
I suggest escalating further, mainly to an EECB.
The same thing happened to my brother before Cingular became AT&T. He had a nice little plan that was $19.99 for like 300 minutes + nights & weekends. When they switched over, they bumped him up to a $39.99 plan with 450 minutes (he never uses that many minutes) + nights & weekends. It took some serious escalating to get them to fix that but they did.
Sounds like a technical issue with the grandfathered plan he had.
Grandfathered plans are awesome until you HAVE to change your plan for any reason.
When the plan change is made, because the grandfathered plan(the OP's Unlimited aircard in this case) has been deleted from the activation system, it isnt possible for any rep he speaks to to have it 'restored' to the old plan.
Put another way, the OP's plan doesnt exist anymore in Verizons systems, which makes it kinda hard to re-activate when a change is made.
Go to a Verizon corporate location with your old bill ,request an audience with the branch manager and run this issue by them. You'll then have a face and name to rely on for a solution, and if they dont take care of business THEN an EECB is in order. Ive seen district-level over-rides done on plan reversals ( although with a different carrier).
Hope this helps.
Smok3
@wagenejm:
Meh, who cares, their DNS servers are broken with the re-direct to advertising bloated "search" nonsense anyway.
@Raekwon: And the correct solution there was for them to lose all your money as you go down the street. Even if you end up with the same features you would have at your old bank, at least you'd be showing them the same loyalty they're showing you.
@wagenejm: The problem is they will charge him, if he does not pay they will send it to collections, and then have his credit adversely effected. He probably would have to pay the bill then bring Verizon to small claims.
Also, it is not clear without reading what he agreed to that he is *legally* in the right. Verizon may have something saying they can change the terms and since the OP did not read every bill you never know if in small print on the back of one of these bills they told him they were changing and if he did not opt out of the change in X days he agreed. I am not familiar enough with these types of contracts to know.
I doubt Verizon is going to contest it though if the OP pays then brings Verizon to small claims to get the ETF back whoever is right. I am just saying you are simplifying the situation a bit.
Further, I will note even if Verizon is *legally* right I am not agreeing with their actions - I am just pointing out that how you lay the situation out may be to simple.
It is not impossible. They just won't do it. VZW took the oppurtunity to rob the OP from an old contract that they want to get rid of. To keep the cake and also eat it, they sticked him with the new 5GB limit contract. If the OP fights hard enough, they might let go or give him back the old contract. Otherwise, most people don't have the time and resources to fight with big corporation on these issues and will just suck it up. That's the kind of customers that all the telcos want.
@wagenejm: The worst part is that Verizon's service is superior to all the others, and that no matter what he does, he will either live with Verizon or live with something inferior.
Comcast did the same thing with me. I had internet with another company for $30 unlimited. Comcast came in and took over, and I was grandfathered in.
Fast forward to about 6 months ago - problem with my line. (I live at the end of their "loop" so apparently I get "trash" through the line & usually it takes a tech to climb up the pole outside my house & fix something to make my internet to start working again - something they need to do every 6-8 months).
Well of course when you call in, you can't just say "do what you did last time", you need to go through all the darn troubleshooting things again. This time it also included switching modems to see if that would fix it, which it did not.
[NOTE - REMEMBER THIS POINT OF TIME]
So finally they called a tech out to climb the pole & fix the issues (which happened to be the same tech who did it many times before for me with the past company, and said "yes, wish they would just call me first I could have told them exactly what the problem is")
Anyway, fast forward - My bill is not $20 higher. Why? Because I tried to switch modems, and that modem switch (even if it was only temporary and did not help) was a break in my contract to get me grandfathered in so now I had to pay the higher comcastic rate for the same service.
THOSE SON OF A B*TCHES.... I fought and fought. Did end up getting a $20 a month credit for 6 months to offset the increase which should be up soon, which means it's about time for me to call and complain as much as I can about the higher price until they give me the credit longer I guess.
STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID.
@TuxthePenguin: The big problem is that he mentioned that he "kept getting bills in the expected amounts" so he paid the bill for the new contract more than once. He may have agreed to the plan simply by paying for it.
If he had caught it with the first bill that showed the change, he'd have an easy case in SCC, but we need to know how many bills he paid after the switch.
Lesson for the day - read your bills and statements, people.
TMobile did the opposite. I was grandfathered into a $20/month BIS plan and canceled the plan for 2 months when I wouldn't have my blackberry. In the meantime, they raised the rates to $25/month. When I wanted to reactivate my service, I called in, told the rep that I had been previously on a $20/month plan. She took a quick glance at the records, looked up the code for the old rate plan, and put me on it.
In this case, I didn't deserve an old plan/price, yet they gave it to me anyway.
That's a photo of pro-wrestling star Chuck Taylor!
He is not entitled to continue with unlimited data. Verizon didn't break the contract, HE did ... by removing his wife from the account. THAT is a "material change." It affects how likely they are to recover funds if the account becomes delinquent.
They apparently lied to him, and for that part they are very very wrong. But, I agree with Verizon that removing a person from the account is a meaningful change in the contract. After that event, they are free to offer only the terms that they want (in this case 5 GB), and he should be free to accept or reject the terms.
He signed a contract in 2004 with him and his wife sharing the same plan, now 5 years they get divorced and had to change the account to his name.
By him removing his ex-wife name from, he is extensionally changing the contract.
@DoubleEcho: "Excuse me, sir. Seeing as how the V.P. is such a V.I.P., shouldn't we keep the P.C. on the Q.T.? 'Cause if it leaks to the V.C. he could end up M.I.A., and then we'd all be put out in K.P. "
@TuxthePenguin: I strongly disagree that a person should "reasonably understand" that Verizon customer service is lying to him about being able to keep his service, and that there are hidden rules to secretly sign him up for service he does not want.
We're not talking about the fine print that says things like Verizon is not responsible if you injure yourself while using your phone. This is intentional dishonesty and contract-breaking by Verizon.
@Colonel Jack O'Neill: Then don't lie to him and tell him he will be able to keep the contract, and don't sign him up for services he did not request.
@Colonel Jack O'Neill: No. Removing one party, with that party's consent (or no consent needed) from a cell phone contract does not change the contract and is expressly provided for within the contract.
The only requirements is that it not change the plan if you are still within your promotional period, or not change the plan in cases like this. Clearly, he -did not want- the plan to change, and Verizon did it anyway.
Cingular tried to do this for years with my Mom and her unlimited minutes for $60 a month plan she had from like, '98. She had to refuse all phone upgrades, and remained on a higher tier of account fees to avoid getting rid of the plan.
But removing her husband's line, and eventually my line (minor child at the time), since we were outside our promotional period, -did not- change the contract. They tried to get rid of her unlimited, but in the end she read them word for word where the removal of a user is covered and won out and kept it.
@Xerloq speaks Portuguese, too...: As far as I understand, if the company in question changes a term on the contract (e.g. Unlimited data to 5GB cap, or $0.15/text message charge to $0.20) you have a month - the billing cycle - to cancel with no ETF because of a material adverse change. It's been longer than that, so I don't know if he'll get anywhere, though perhaps with an EECB.
Always read your bills in detail!
@ndonahue: Dude, at first I thought your comment had been disemvoweled. But then DoubleEcho and diasdiem showed me the error of my ways. TYVM.
@TuxthePenguin: Look on the bright side. He probably already has a lawyer and process server on retainer -- what's another couple of billable hours on top of the divorce?
Having worked at Verizon for a few years I know of a possible but little used procedure. No one at the store or in the regular customer care will be able to help out because old plans are not available. I'd suggest going into a store and asking a rep to submit a request to change to an old price plan.
It's possible, but not well known and and not regularly used so don't be surprised if the rep looks confused. They should be able to look up the procedure in the InfoManager database and submit a request. There is a time limit on this so I'd suggest doing it sooner rather than later...I honestly forget if its 60 or 90 days, but I don't think it's 30.
Basically this submission goes to another department that has greater control over a customer's account and allows older price plans to be applied to a mobile number (including aircards).
@johneutah21: Also wanted to add: I've never actually successfully used this program before. I submitted a request once but it was subsequently denied due to the customer being outside the "window." I hope all goes well though. I've not heard of this program being discontinued, so as long as the rep is competent it ought to work. I do apologize for your troubles though.
@SJPadbury: Agreed. The bank is making money on the money you have deposited, and if they can't (for whatever reason, legit or otherwise) provide you with the same levels of service and account features just because you're doing something ~50% of people do at some point in their lives, then you take the money and find another bank. You might be in the same boat with no free "perks", but the bank is without your funds. In the grand scheme it's a raindrop in the ocean, but if more folks voted with their wallets when companies enacted arbitrary, silly, and very non-customer-friendly policies like this the effects would put them on notice that their greatest assets are their customers wanting to continue to do business with them, not how they can screw them today.
@Silversmok3: I think you miss a point - they've removed the plan from *new* accounts, but the plan still exists as they're still able to *bill* him on it. I agree it might be impossible to create a new account with those options, and that may have even been the terms of the grandfather agreement, but that's not documented anywhere. Given Verizon's track record on things like this, they lack my support of their decision in this stance unless they can prove otherwise. If it really is impossible to do this, they should have been able to tell him so and explained why - the OP may have even understood and agreed, or at least had known and been able to make an informed decision on whether or not to terminate his account - but since we know the latter is likely why Verizon doesn't empower their front-line phone folks with this info, it's likely they did it in the hopes he wouldn't notice or complain.
@Ilo: Depending on the contract with a cell phone provider, there are actually clauses in there that state that removing one member from the contract with that party's consent *does not* materially change the contract. I don't know if this is the case with Verizon's contracts or not, but it used to be fairly common and I had a contract with Verizon that had this specific stipulation before moving to a different carrier. The OP should check his contract - he may in fact have not actually changed the contract, leaving Verizon's change as the only material change and thus he should be absolved from any ETF fees here.
@cluberti: "The bank is making money on the money you have deposited..." Where have you been lately? The bank makes money on fees (mainly overdraft fees). Unless you have an enormous amount of money in the account the bank is only going to care about keeping your business if you pay fees and lots of them.
Verizon was actually very good to us.
Three years ago our daughter was diagnosed with leukemia, we ended up making lots and lots of calls from the hospital the first three weeks, needless to say that we totally forgot about the limits of our plan (which were very low)
when we finally got home from the hospital and got to open the bills, we realized that we racked up almost $2,000 in Verizon charges.
One call to Verizon, and they removed all the charges, and set us up with a plan with enough minutes.
no need to beg, talk to a supervisor, nothing to write, they did not even ask for a proof (we could be lying to them about the situation just to get out of paying). just a few minutes on the phone with a rep, and they took care of it.
I've had VERY VERY good luck with Verizon executive customer service. Send an EECB and you should get this resolved quickly. Remember to BE NICE
When there's a change to a policy or plan there's usually a note on your bill notifying you of the change with a URL to their website where you can go for more information.
Most people don't notice these things however and say that they were never notified
@Ilo: Material change and materially adverse change are different, and it may make a difference. The cell phone carrier is not negatively impacted by his wife not being on the account if the bill still gets paid - in fact it may be positively impacted as usage may drop since fewer people will now use it..
@MattSaintCool: When I worked for Sprint, I would run into issues where someone who was on an old, no longer available plan would get stuck on a new plan by a clueless or incompetent rep (believe me there were a lot of them) and we would be unable to get the old plan back, because even in our master plan list, which did include certain older plans, it wasn't there. It had been taken completely out of the system, there was no way I, as the agent, could restore the plan.
I had a sup call once where my supervisor and the customer went around in circles because all he wanted was his old plan back and she continually explained to him that was impossible because the old plan had been removed from the system. I do not know if he was allowed to escape without an ETF.
@montusama: If they are not directly involved then they have no stick. A rule is only as valid as it is enforceable. The government needs to have people to enforce the rules and that is government involvement.
This is one of the reasons why the entire telecommunications industry needs "guidelines" to follow.
Before anyone thinks I want the government directly involved in the industry, I don't. I think the government should make a few simple guidelines that these companies can not do, to help protect us, but still not to be directly involved.