Verizon

Worst experience as a customer at this store. After installing the «system update» on my droid, my phone crashed — making it the networks fault. I was visiting Portland out of state, at the the, and was traveling back home that same day. I thought I would simple have the phone fixed and be on my way, since a phone is a very important device to have while traveling. When I got there they had a very snooty attitude towards my phone crashing, they told me the best thing to do is to «buy» another phone, pay the activation fee (that I will loose) and return it when I arrive home. This was unacceptable, since it was verizons fault. I even spoke to one of the managers, who also told me the same thing. One of the employees who looked at my phone scuffed «oh man you are screwed» ?? Absolute worse employees I have ever encountered, I left furious AND was still without a phone on a travel day, it was extremely frustrating. I’m thinking about writing a letter to corporate, but I never got the name of the employees. Seriously wish I did, they don’t deserve being employed during these times.

NEVER, never, again will I do business with Verizon, I don’t care if it’s phone, wireless, internet, business, making a sandwich or wiping my backside. I don’t trust them with anything, and I’m happy to not give them any money.
Disclaimer: I have fairly good credit, never defaulted on a phone bill or internet bill in my life. I am not a supporter or dissenter of corporations, just good honest people.
Here’s my 3 key experiences with Verizon:
A. We cancelled our cell phones because my wife gets free ATT from her work. In doing so we didn’t want to pay the early termination fee from Verizon, which at the time was early cell phone days, and was going to cost us almost $ 500 for both lines. We waited patiently until our contract was up for renewal. 3 months ahead of time I called to schedule a canellation on our END date. Verizon said that would count as early termination even though I was going to pay for the next 3 full months! Secondly they said that I would have to call in exactly 14 days prior to our end date to avoid an early termination charge AND to avoid being billed one additional month. I put up with it, called on the 14^th day exactly, got a verbal confirmation and a written number cancelled the phones.
Low and behold, six months later an Early Termination Charge shows up on my credit report! Holy Piss! Are you kidding? Not only had they hit my credit, but they NEVER sent me a statement. This for a charge I shouldn’t be paying anyway. After hours of phone calls they removed the charge but REFUSED to take it off my credit report. After MAILING Them the written confirmation they finally did it. And I vowed never to do business with them again.
B. Until I started a business in 2008, and we needed phone lines and internet. Oh sure the rep said, we can do that for you and scheduled a technician and installation. Two WEEKS Go by and no one shows up. After repeated calls I finally get someone to tell me that they DID install it. Ooops! Looks like the tech Charged us for installation, reported to his superiors that it was done, but never actually did the work! Keep in mind this is about a month into business with no phones but our cellular service. Days go by and no one shows up, so I call back in to Verizon and ask them to cancel the service. No problem, «but why would you leave Verizon.» Oh I don’t know, becasue you can’t even get the phone installed? How can I use it? Happy, and vowing to myself never to use Verizon again I get a BILL — FOR THE EFFING INSTALLATION THAT NEVER HAPPENED AND THE FIRST MONTH OF SERVICE! Balls, this is ridiculous. After TWO YEARS! They finally drop it and remove the account from my credit report AGAIN! In the meantime they had even hired a collection company to pursue the «debt» of about $ 178 and change. The guy on the phone at Verizon’s collection department said «I understand that you’re probably right, but c’mon this is a big corporation and how much time do you want to put into fighting this thing. Tell you what, I’ll charge you only $ 75 dollars and we can close the account today.» Believe me when I say I gave that young man a speech that changed his life.. Finally they dropped the charge and I never paid anything out of principle. Oh, but I did vow to never go with Verizon again AND promptly give bad word of mouth to anyone who would listen.
C. Moved the business, and comcast didn’t serve the area so our choices are: Verizon, Allegience Telecom, and Integra Telecom.
Back to the big V: I look online and go to order the 55/​mo business package. In an effort to showcase their strong technical capabilities the online ordering software, WHERE THEY COLLECT MONEY, crashes. Desktop, Laptop, Internet Explorer, Firefox. None of it works. Finally I call in and ask to get the same package. «I have a great promotional rate for you today, it’s a pretty good deal, $ 89 a month for the first year, and then it’s only $ 110 per month after that on a 4 year commitment.» That is special, and I’ll tell you where you can stick it because I’m looking at the internet right now, «oh sorry sir we don’t honor the internet pricing, I don’t know anything about that.» I get it, it’s cost comparative, incentive to order online, but a $ 40-​$ 60 dollar difference in price! No thanks. I get the bright idea to go to online chat support and ask about the web special. The tech types in 3 sentences and says she’ll check into it, her final words are thanks for your patience. The sessions ultimately ends due to inactivity on Verizon’s side. WTF? Maybe it’s better to email support and tell them what’s going on, after about an hour I get an email back that looks personally written. «The best way to service your needs is to sign up online for the web special…»
There’s some serious ineptitude going on here. Run. Run far and away from Verizon. I’m going to keep my promise this time.

It is horrifying to even give them one star. Double billing, call centers not open on time, turning our service off when they tried to bill an innacurate account number… oh, and when we canceled our auto pay due to all the issues, they continued to try to bill the bad account number (thus them canceling our services all the time). When we called to cancel, they didnt cancel our account and continued to bill us for services even when we switched to comcast. They lied, lied lied without appology. I could tell you more, but its just more of the same. Our complaint letters and calls cuntinue to go unanswered… the lack of service is so shameful, you could not technically call it service. Comcast has been a gem to us and is SOOOOOOO much cheaper. We canceled months ago and we are still tyring to get the whole mess sorted. Good luck to those trying to call during their alleged call center hours, getting them to note your account or getting your issue resolved on one call. May the force be with you!

The phone and wireless, once we worked out the bugs work. When we first got it installed, Verizon cut our neighbors Comcast line (at a separate junction box). The Comcast investigator said they do that often. It seems Verizon clipping live Comcast lines to keep up a telecom fight at the expense of its customers and their neighbors to be downright scummy and disruptive.
The first guy who installed our FIOS left a mess, did it wrong and messed up our originally functional land line. The second person fixed the FIOS and landline. Neither set up the wireless properly which was a long ordeal trying to diagnose by myself on the phone with tech support.

Pros: Not Comcast
Cons: Still a giant bureaucracy with no customer service.
I chose Verizon after reading about bad experiences with Comcast. Since I’ve been on hold for one hour now about a billing error, I thought I would use this time to let everyone else know what to expect. Getting the service is pretty efficient. They contract out the installation so that may be hit or miss, mine was fine. However, getting a straight answer on what the service costs is another issue. I signed up online and was quoted $ 64.97 per month. A month later, my credit card was charged $ 77. I also have never received a bill. I called to ask about this and after waiting 15 mins to talk to a rep, was transferred to another department. I’ve been on hold for 45 mins with that dept now.
If I didn’t need the internet, I would spare myself the headache of dealing with them.