Verizon Wireless’s Refunds

October 4th, 2010 by · 4 Comments

Verizon Wireless plans to issue up to $90M in refunds to 15 million mobile customers who were charged for data time they didn’t use. As in, their phone was not in use at the time.  Apparently it was possible for Verizon’s software to spend your money when you didn’t, even if you didn’t even *have* a data plan.  Each charge itself was mostly negligible, and each consumer will get back  only a few dollars.  But because they have so many customers, the accidentally collected booty added up to a nice little pile.

The FCC has been pushing the investigation, of course, and deserves credit in this case for actually protecting the public interest.  What I can’t figure out is…  How the hell do you not notice an extra $90M lying around?  I’ll bet if Verizon were *missing* $90M they’d have noticed rather quickly.  As with bank errors, such things are very rarely in favor of the consumer.

The FCC has received ‘hundreds of complaints’.  Can you imagine how many complaints *Verizon* got before deciding to act?  It’s not like Joe Citizen has the FCC on speed dial.  Hey, maybe now they’ll be able to save money on those call centers…

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Categories: ILECs, PTTs · Wireless

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4 Comments So Far


  • It’s sad that a company can “make” an extra $90million and not even notice (or at least pretend not to notice). I caught a glimpse of this story on the news this morning and it sounded like this has been going on for nearly 2 years now and because it’s taken Verizon so long to pay up, they might get hit some addition fines.

  • carlkj says:

    LOL! I guess you mean that they will now make up the difference by laying off call center workers and adding to UE?

    I see these two monopolistic dinosaurs in the telecom space keep making new highs notwithstanding one of my yearly calls that one of them, T Rex specifically, as a result of legacy pension, healthcare and unions weighing it down, in addition to shrinking markets especially in its last growth frontier along the wireless space, would begin their implosion phase even though trace amounts of copper representing vestigial organs might continue to exist.

    The government and regulators must abandon this too big to fail, too comfortable and cozy century long relationships it continues to endorse in favor of advancing the internet’s promise, one that bodes well for every liberty seeking individual in their land.

  • lucky me says:

    6$ each ???
    I’m a millionaire
    http://4k26bj.dev3.webenabled.net/archives/7

  • carlkj says:

    What should I wish for next?

    Oh yes, a new, fresh, untainted 3rd party which refuses to pay homage to the Money Changers in their Temples, both domestically and internationally, at the same time throwing their tables upside down on their heads and taking control of our own money supply in favor of, “We The People!”

    Will Abomination do that for me, too? I guess I have to take what I can get from him!

    If these scoundrels can succeed at selling on this news tomorrow, there should be guns fired! IMO

    http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20101004-713842.html

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