A couple in Oregon started mobile phone service with Verizon Wireless, then decided not to stick with the company after some billing weirdness. Something obviously wasn’t right when they received a first bill of $698, so they decided to return their phones and bail. Now, almost a year later, Verizon claims that their account has an outstanding balance of $2,156,593.64, which is one heck of an early termination fee.

The couple has been doing battle with collection agencies, which have sent letters asking for the comparatively tiny amount of maybe $2,000. While everyone they talk to at Verizon and elsewhere agrees that the bills are obviously in error, no one they’ve dealt with has apparently had the power to make the bills go away.

Now that they’re trying to close on a house, the couple brought their case to a local news station. A reporter got to hear the actual recording on the automated system.

For these customers, there’s good news, which shows the power of escalating your complaint to a higher power at Verizon when needed. Verizon was able to fix the error, and let’s hope they stop any erroneous collection notices.

In a follow-up statement, Verizon said:

We have apologized to an Oregon customer for a programming error in an automated voice response system. The error caused him to receive an incorrect voice message that he owed $2 million on his bill. We are correcting the error now and have resolved the issue to his satisfaction.

Couple gets $2 million cell phone bill [KPTV]

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