Verizon Family Plan Members - Be Aware
Since my father’s death in January, there have been a lot of things to deal with. His passing was wholly unexpected, and although he was a stickler for order and detail, there were many loose ends to tie up and things to do. One of those things that we didn’t deal with right away was my parents’ Verizon cell phone plan. My parents had a family plan with my two younger brothers (with my Dad as the authorized accountholder) and they were in a contract until the end of May. In February, my mom and youngest brother went to a Verizon store and after about an hour, left and gave up on getting just my dad’s phone cancelled before the end of the contract. The ineptitude of the employees (who basically claimed they couldn’t do anything, even with a death certificate, unless my mom wanted to pay a huge early termination fee) made my mom decide that the effort was better saved for other things.
But as I said, their contract ended in May, so last week, my mom and brother made another trek to the Verizon store, this time to end their phone plan (that was no longer under contract, they thought) and sign up for a different plan that more suited their needs (my other brother is joining his fiancee’s plan instead of another family plan with my mom). And that is where the fun begins. I can only report it secondhand, for I live 1000+ miles away and wasn’t there, but in the 3.5 hours (yes, three and a half hours) that they were there, this is what basically happened.
When they tried to end their phone plan, they were told that if you have a contract, it automatically renews once it ends until the authorized account holder cancels it. The authorized account holder is my dad. And because my dad is dead, he can’t cancel it. So it can’t be cancelled. YES, the first set of employees point blank told my mother and brother that the contract (that had already run out) could not be cancelled by anyone other than my dad, and because he was dead no one could cancel it. My mom had brought the death certificate with her, and the employees told her it didn’t matter, no one else was authorized without my dad giving them authorization, even though he had passed away.
So then my mom told them “Good luck getting William to pay it then beyond the grave” and the employees went to get first a manager, and then after the manager claimed they couldn’t do anything, a supervisor, and the supervisor finally, after consulting “headquarters” and having my mom and brother both refuse to accept they had to keep paying, changed the authorization to my mom and allowed her to cancel it.
This, as I said, took three and a half hours.
So, if you have a Verizon family plan, look into your authorized account holders and see if you can have more than one. Because if the unthinkable happens, Verizon may try to collect from you forever. Literally.
Tomorrow I’ll talk about something I like to balance this rant about things I definitely do not. 
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June 16th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
When my aunt passed away a few years ago we paid up and then cancelled her Rogers Cable. for 2 years they kept calling and mailing in bills.
June 16th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
how completely appalling. I am so sorry you had to go through that!
June 16th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
Wow. That’s absolutely terrible. What awful customer service! How are they unable to deal with a situation like that??? I’m sure it’s not a completely rare occurance.
June 16th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
Wow, that’s crazy! And yet it doesn’t surprise me. I live in Canada, but I used to work in the accounts payable department of a company that had an office in Connecticut. I can’t remember the details, but one time I had to deal with Verizon. I have never dealt with such nonsense in my life. I think it was something like we owed them money, but they wouldn’t accept money from Canada (not even drawn on a US bank), no credit cards, no money orders…nothing. Yet they expected us to pay, even though there was NO WAY. Our Connecticut office was completely closed down by then, so we couldn’t send it to them and have them send it out. They threatened to destroy our company’s credit rating if we didn’t pay, yet we couldn’t pay. They kept saying, “Don’t you know anyone here you could send it to, and have them send it to us?” No, of course we didn’t–we were a business. I said, “Do you mean to tell me that if I send you a cheque, you’re going to send it back?” They didn’t know how to answer that.
I believe we ended up sending them a cheque, and I don’t believe they sent it back.
I remember feeling very sorry for people in the States who got roped into dealing with that company and it’s nonsensical policies.
June 16th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
Unbelievable. How ignorant, shameful and sleazy of Verizon. I use Alltel who is merging with Verizon very soon. Thanks for the warning.
June 16th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
That is so incredibly stupid, and cruel. Gee, guess they could ruin your Dad’s credit rating. Sheesh.
June 16th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
Okay, I understand the store staff being stupid. But why bother trying to “cancel” the plan? If it’s your father’s plan and he dies, all you have to do is mail them a letter with a copy of the death certificate saying “Mr. X has died. Please close this account.”
It doesn’t matter if they say “no, the account can’t be cancelled”. If he’s dead, and the estate has been settled, then what exactly are they going to do with the unpaid bill? Send it to his grave?
June 16th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Wow, that’s awful! I’m sorry your family had to deal with that nonsense. Maybe email the Verizon higherups a link to this post.
June 16th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Wow, that’s so ridiculous, and insensitive. It’s almost hard to believe that they could be so difficult, especially since this surely happens every day (though not at that store).
Have you considered submitting this to the Consumerist, it’s the sort of story that they publish on their website (and that often gets attention from high-level executives)!
June 16th, 2009 at 4:12 pm
How ridiculous! What horrible customer service! I wish more employees in customer service would use common sense and logic while helping customers rather than parroting the company line.
Have you considered sharing your blog post with the folks at www.consumerist.com? They often write about such customer service nightmares…
I’m glad your family members stood their ground!
June 16th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
Maybe this is a stupid question, but Power of Attorney is a legal document which permits a spouse or designated individual to act on the behalf of a person. If you mother has POA, why couldn’t they accept that (besides their stupidity!!)?
June 16th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
That. Is. Insane. So sorry to hear that your mother and brother had to waste so much time with such an idiotic company.
June 16th, 2009 at 6:57 pm
You should really submit this story to Consumerist.com
June 16th, 2009 at 9:27 pm
Ridiculous. Adding to the pain of losing your husband/father.
June 17th, 2009 at 5:14 am
Appalling. I would definitely write a letter to someone higher up at Verizon at Verizon headquarters to explain what happened. They will probably try to “make good” on their employees’ bad behavior by refunding some of the months your mother paid, etc.
June 17th, 2009 at 7:13 am
That is insane. I’m sorry your family had to go through that. They should contact the Consumerist.
June 17th, 2009 at 7:27 am
Two words:
1) Unbelievable
2) Lawsuit
Did someone jump out and yell, “You’re on Candid Camera!”?
June 17th, 2009 at 8:32 am
Yeah. Verizon is annoying. My folks and I set up an account for our phones based on their corporation. It’s always a mess for us to get our phones upgraded or contracts changed. I can’t walk into a store and change things because they are complete idiots about national service vs local service. (The contract was made 5 yrs ago when I lived in the same state as my parents.)
I’m sorry your mother had to deal with a company that lacks common sense to do the right thing. I say you let Consumerist.com know about it.
June 17th, 2009 at 12:33 pm
My mother in law passed away while she was on our plan, and we didn’t have any problems getting her off. My husband called, and they did it right then, without even seeing a death certificate. She wasn’t the primary on the account though.
I have had quite a few bad experiences with them though. I would switch, but my whole family is with them, so we would need too many more minutes if we were to go with another company.
June 17th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
A similar thing happened to my Mom when my father died. Mom and Dad were both on the account and when she called to have my Dad’s name removed from the account she was told that she needed to drive to a location (an hour away) with a certified death certificate before they could even TALK to her about it. Mom asked to talk to a manager and told the manager that she’d be happy to fax Dad’s death certificate but as her name was ALSO on the account, she shouldn’t need to. The manager held firm so my Mom cancelled the account and switched to Sprint. My brother, sister, brother-in-law and I did so as well and told Verizon exactly why.
June 17th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
This is one of those cases where, when faced with the fact of the policyholder’s death, common sense should have prevailed. Once the Verizon people started insisting nothing could be done despite the death is when i would have asked for address, phone and name of CEO and take it up with them. That’s just ridiculous.
June 17th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
I think I would have told them that the bill would not be paid since my husband didn’t live at that address anymore. When they asked for his new billing address, I would have ever so sweetly replied “_______ Cemetary, Plot 28, Town, State, Zip Code”. When they replied that it wasn’t acceptablel, I would have replied that their incompetence was acceptable either, so I guess we’re even.
Verizon service has always been great for me. We plan to update our contract to add my daughter, so I’ll be sure to ask about this when we stop in the store to make this change. I’m the only adult in the household, so it will be interesting to hear their answer.
June 17th, 2009 at 8:28 pm
Sorry, would have replied that their response was NOT acceptable either… Someday I’ll remember to proofread, but obviously not today!
June 17th, 2009 at 9:09 pm
This does not surprise me at all. The stupidity of people working at the retail level never ceases to amaze me. I have a research firm and I would have called corporate after the first incident. The best thing you can do is go to hoovers or some other similar site that lists corporate executives and contact someone higher up. They do not like to hear about this sort of thing. It makes them and the company look bad. I guarantee you would have gotten some action if you had contacted a senior VP of the company.
Sorry your family had to go through this.
June 17th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
Screaming outrageous. Cell phone providers are completely, utterly unregulated…and this is the result. Just inexcusable.
June 18th, 2009 at 7:33 am
I’m sorry for your loss.
I recommend going to The Consumerist website and search for the Verizon EECB (Executive Email Carpet Bomb). They have e-mail addresses for all kinds of executives in all kinds of companies. Then you e-mail the snot out of them and let them know what a horrible policy this is and what a poor job the local store did.
June 18th, 2009 at 8:56 am
Your poor Mom. I am glad I never went with Verizon. Shame on them.
June 18th, 2009 at 10:16 am
I hate it when they automatically renew contracts. I had a one-year contract with my Primus for my internet connection. I called them 28 days before it expired to say I would not be renewing it (only out of courtesy - I did’t think they needed that much notice) and they charged me a cancellation fee because I didn’t give them 30 days notice. I was livid. I managed to get them to whittle it down to $5 from $40 and decided I was willing to pay $5 to get off the phone.
June 20th, 2009 at 1:27 pm
That is utterly appalling.
June 21st, 2009 at 2:29 pm
Ditto to all. Hope they start some in store customer service training
June 21st, 2009 at 10:58 pm
Wow. That is just appalling!
Verizon customer service really isn’t known for the being the best…ugh…
June 24th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
I, too, am sorry your family had to be put through this. I suggest you contact your state’s Attorney General’s office to report Verizon’s conduct.
On the other hand, in the current economy, I wonder how many deadbeats (who are not really dead) are trying to get out of contracts or bills by having a family member report them as dead. I hate to think that, but I expect a lot of people would try anything to get out of paying.
In general, though cell phone contracts are horribly oppressive to consumers.
June 25th, 2009 at 10:35 pm
In the interest of equal time, Sprint did something very similar to me when my brother passed away. Luckily, he was on his own plan and I was doing Sprint a favor in letting them know (as his estate didn’t have anything to pay with in the first place).
The customer service rep was insensitive and as a result, I took my account away from Sprint as did several other family members.
They even still send marketing mailers to my house for my brother. *sheesh*
I figured my experience was a one-time thing… sorry to hear your family went through something similar with a different company.
June 29th, 2009 at 9:57 am
This is so true. We also have a family plan, my DH and I originally had only 2 phones on the account,m we have since included our daughter and both our moms on the plan. Well, when all our phones were newly activated some of them had internet access and some didn’t. We never ordered the internet choice so when I tried calling to have them cancel the internet on the phones they wouldn’t do it. I was not *authorized* on the plan to make any changes. My husband was the only one who could make changes. I went to their website and looked into our account and there was a section that would let you ADD another authorized user onto the account. So I added my name to the account. Called the 1800 # again and low and behold ! Sure, Mrs.—- we can fix that for you right now since you are a authorized user on the plan. Try that next time, see if you can add another user to the account through the online site and then you may be able to change the problem you have.