I regret even thinking about signing on for another 2 years with verizon

Question

I have been very stable in my relations with my cell phone providers; however, Verizon has proven to be a big let-down.  I started my cell phone usage years ago with Cellular One who I had no issues with concerning plan provisions or bills.  Altell bought out Cellular One and I had probably a handful of problems.  Now that Verizon has bought out my Altell, I have had to call EVERY SINGLE MONTH for some screwed up something.  Yes, I had a lot of problems that the solution always seemed to be "to upgrade to a Verizon phone and plan."  And apparently I enrolled in the "surprise plan" from Verizon because every time I get a bill "SURPRISE!" I have been duped on one thing and charged outlandishly for it.  I had a gentleman from a local provider talk me into recontracting with Verizon to upgrade my phone and he ensured he would personally see to it that I was taken care of and the problems as before would not burden me any longer.  Seems, however, that even he can't fix it all.  Some of the issues are so deep-seeded in the company's greed for a monopoly, that they are untouchable by the employees that actually care about their customers' satisfaction.  I have been billed time and time again for services that I never used and billed extensively for services that were free thru Altell (Verizon omits these differences in their sales spill).  I am aware that this message will probably not get posted, so for those who do read this, think strongly about making things right by the customers that otherwise would be loyal and sing your praises.  I am the type of person who likes to post positive reinforcements about products and services and it breaks my heart that I have nothing positive to say about this company. 

Answer 1

I had a similar experience with Suncom (later bought by AT&T).  I was about to start school in Blacksburg, VA.  The salesman asked me what the nearest city was and I told him Roanoke.  He looked at his list and said yes, they have coverage in Roanoke, so I didn't have to worry about roaming - I would always be on the network.
Well, Blacksburg is 20 minutes from Roanoke and, of course, they did not have coverage in Blacksburg.  By the time I found out, it was past the 30 days (and I'm not sure I even knew about the 30 days at the time anyway.)  So I wound up having to pay $10 or $20 extra per month for a pool of 200 roaming minutes until they got coverage in Blacksburg about six months later.  They further antagonized me when, even though I had it setup for them to bill my credit card automatically, they would send me late notices.  It was ridiculous - they could bill my credit card whenever they wanted to so if it was late, it how in the world was it my fault?
After a year of putting up with it and getting angry every time I talked with one of their support people, I switched to nTelos.  They were dirt cheap, but their signal quality was horrendous.  When out in the middle of nowhere, I was often having to borrow a phone from someone with Verizon.
Finally, I bought a Droid and switched to Verizon and between Verizon wireless and FIOS for my house, I'm paying less than I was all together with my old cable provider + nTelos, so I'm very happy with Verizon.
TedKord wrote:
Fifteen or more years ago, when I went to get my family's first  small cell phones (I had a bag phone prior-whadda convenient thing to own!! ) I picked up two clamshell phones on the ATT network.  This was back in the days or mucho roaming.
The salesman assured me that ATT's coverage in our area was perfect. He also told me that there was a 50-mile radius around my home address in which there would be no roaming charges.
Well, needless to say, the coverage was awful. Once, my wife was in her car with our daughter. I was in my car about 2 miles away when her car broke down. She couldn't call me. No signal.
So, I called within the 30 days to cancel the contract, as was allowed. The ATT CS rep took down my information, made some token offer to keep my service, then told me how much I owed. There were over $100 in roaming charges. I had never been more than 10 miles from my home address since I'd gotten the phone.
I told her that there should be no roaming charges, I was within the 50 mile radius no-roaming area. She told me that there was no such provision. I complained that I couldn't get a signal almost everywhere I went with the phone. She informed me that ATT had no cell towers in my area, so I shouldn't expect a signal. I asked her why they sold service in an area where they had none, and told her that the salesman had assured me that ATT coverage saturated my area and that there was no roaming within 50-miles of my home.
She informed me that ATT wasn't responsible for what their salesforce said. I informed her I wasn't responsible for the roaming charges, and I wasnt paying a penny of it, so she might as well send me to collections right now. After another 40 minutes of arguing on the phone, she erased the charges. I returned the phones, got two from Verizon and have been with them ever since. (Probably going to be with Sprint come Feb. 2011)
Dishonest behavior isn't limited to one carrier. All have unscrupulous people, and good people, too.