How far will a
cell phone service provider go to get your money? Apparently, all the way to the grave.
According to the St. Petersburg Times, Verizon wouldn't cancel Cynthia Lacy's father's contract after he died last year, even after she showed the company his death certificate.
Lacy didn't know her father's personal identification number (PIN), which promoted a Verizon customer service employee to tell her they couldn't shut down the account. Lacy explained the situation, including how she'd sent a copy of the death certificate. But the employee said there was nothing he or she could do without the PIN, and then had the poor taste to laugh before hanging up. What's worse, Lacy and her family couldn't settle her father's estate until this problem was resolved.
So Lacy contacted the
Consumer's Edge column at the St. Petersburg Times about the situation. Soon after, the negative publicity had Verizon singing a different tune. The company recently admitted its mistake, canceled the account and refunded Lacy for the months in which the account was wrongly charged. Here's the lesson to be learned: keep all your PINs, passwords and account numbers in a safe place accessible to your family in case of emergency. Otherwise, you (and your loved ones) could be stuck in cell phone purgatory. [From:
TampaBay.com, via
The Consumerist]
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Tags: cellphone, customer service, death, money, pin numbers, top, verizon
Comments
87
Subscribe to commentsrichiepr77Mar 7th 2010 9:14AM
"Can you hear me now?"
From the grave: "Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo............."
:)
(Unverified)Mar 7th 2010 11:33PM
omg thats some epic lulz
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 8:40PM
my thought exactly
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 3:07PM
I had so many problems with Verizon that after 7 months of trying to resolve the issue, I canceled my service. Worse customer service I have ever (not) received anywhere. What a lousy company
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 7:07PM
Oh, so true, Verizon is a BS company. I pay my Verizon bill online. It was the due date and low and behold they were having problems with their website which would not allow me to pay my bill ontime. I sent them a nasty email saying that I would try again the next day to pay only to receive a "response" which was no response at all. They did not charge me the $7 late charge plus 1.5% but I was left hanging until I received the next bill. Crappy customer service, I agree.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:13PM
No one should have to give their pin numbers to anyone in their family. Verizon should have taken the death certificate and been done with it, the greedy bastards.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 7:07PM
I agree, junior. And personally I think I would have derived more pleasure setting a consumer group on them. I did that to NetZero, and got not just my remaining unused balance refunded, but ALL the money I paid them!
Sorry if this upsets you money-grubbing republicans out there.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:15PM
typical verizon.. always a hassel with them.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:29PM
Seeing that Verizon is principal in this instance should not surprise anyone. As one above writers defines :"The Bastards" is infact being kind in the discription
of this corporation.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:36PM
That's not necessarily true! First of all if you keep these numbers in your home and ,God forbid, you have a break-in someone else gets these numbers! If you don't set up a pin with Verizon all you need when you call in is the last 4 digits of your SS# and they take care of everything! So just don't set one up and your relatives should be fine because that's the question they ask!!
Who writes this crap? Do they ever actually do any research anymore or just babble things off the top of their heads! That's why all the good journalists are retiring like Charlie Gibson because writers and newscasters just bable whatever they want and do nothing to verify the facts. Later they say oops and it's all ok! Gee that's what their parent's sent them to college for! TAKE PRIDE IN YOUR WORK!
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 3:02PM
Did you do any research? Verizon is notorious for ripping off its customers. The report came from an individual that told the story. Only a moron would claim that it is unequivocally false with out anything to back it up. As the article says, Verizon refunded the money hence I would imagine that it is true. Perhaps you should get a grip on reality before you post ridiculous comments.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 3:53PM
Linda, you must work for Verizon. They should have accepted the the daughter's death certificate and STFU. PIN numbers are private, and maybe her father's death was unexpected (they didn't say). This particular employee at Verizon is a moron and should at a minimum be reprimanded -- if it is company policy, then they need to change it! Good for her for going to the newspaper.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 7:12PM
You sound like you work for verizon. I believe every word of this story. Verizon is a bunch of idiots. I know a Lady who is with Verizon who used have her account set up to have her payment automatically deducted each month from her account but no more because Verizon took her monthly payment but kept taking it to the tune of 4 in that week. The only way she stopped it was went to the bank and stopped it. Needless to say she no allows them to automatically deduct anything from her account. ATT and TMobile is no better. People like to talk about Sprint. I have been with Sprint for years and could not be any happier.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:35PM
It's called a PIN for a reason - personal, as in mine. It is not now
nor will it ever be a FIN as in family. And while we're at it Caleb,
why not mail me your SSN.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:47PM
keeping your passwords shouldn't be necessary if you have provided a death certificate to prove the account isn't being used, what a stupid statement by the author!
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:51PM
Come on folks, all the person had to do was to ask for the rep's supervisor, and/or up the ladder. Also, they could go to Verizon and get it straightened out in person -- quickly. Why must something so simple get into the newspaper and now on AOL?
The person at Verizon was dumb, to be sure, but all she had to do was to bump it up to a supervisor. I have done it myself and no problems.
Why do we have to bash Verizon for the stupidity of one cust service person. And yes, I am a Verizon subscriber but have no stock or otherwise vested in them. I have my own beefs with them, but I settle them by calling and getting the right person and working it out,
(Unverified)Mar 9th 2010 9:22PM
that is not true, i have asked for a supervisor and been denied to talk to anyone else, and yes i heard the supervisor in the background of the conversation that he said "i don't care tel,l him no!! i will not speak to anyone!"
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 7:25PM
How do you know this was not a supervisor they were talking to. The problem here is that why should they be force to to that. More importatly is that Verizon has a history of screwing people around.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 2:54PM
After my father died, I kept getting phone calls from creditors and I would give them the address to the cemetary.
(Unverified)Mar 8th 2010 3:20PM
Andy,
I did the same thing with tax collectors