Thursday, November 12, 2009

How Verizon Sticks It to Their Cell Customers

If you are a Verizon cell phone customer, you need to read this article by The New York Times tech editor, David Pogue. Verizon has doubled its early contract termination fee to $350, charges $1.99 data download charge every time you accidentally hit the button on your phone that connects you to the Internet (even if you hit "End" within a couple seconds after hitting the connect key), and refuses to shorten its 15-seconds of instructions on how to leave a voice-mail message—time that accumulates against your minutes allocation.

As Pogue concludes, "Why wouldn't it be a hugely profitable move to start pitching yourself as the GOOD cell company, the one that actually LIKES its customers?"

2 comments:

  1. William, I wanted to respond by addressing the Verizon subscribers who would be affected by this increase of ETF because they are considering changing to another provider due to a high Verizon plan cost. We tend to think of wireless costs as fixed, but you can tinker with your current Verizon Wireless plan to optimize its features to best suit your usage and often generate significant savings in the process. I know this firsthand because I work in the consumer advocacy division of the company Validas, where we electronically audit and subsequently reduce the average cell bill by 22 percent through our website, http://www.fixmycellbill.com (and I'll add that 22 percent equates to over $450 per year for the average user). Put simply, Validas guards against frivolous and unnecessary charges that over-inflate a cell bill.

    You can find out for free if fixmycellbill.com can modify your plan to better suit your individual needs by going to the website. For more info, check out Validas in the national news media, most recently on Fox News at http://www.myfoxtampabay.com/dpp/consumer/conlaw/lower_cell_phone_bills_072409 .

    Good luck to everyone reading on cutting the wireless costs, especially in light of this unforgiving economy.

    Dylan
    Consumer Advocacy, fixmycellbill.com

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  2. WK Note: Re: the comment by Dylan -- I don't know Dylan personally but am posting his comment (even though it amounts to a commercial advertisement) just as a public service. If fixmycellbill.com can lower users' costs legitimately, then I assume it's a good thing.

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