Verizon at Home

[#1]

The lyrics of singer Bobby McFerrin’s 1989 Grammy award winning song “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” ring true this week as we introduce new consumer-friendly changes to the way we offer our FiOS bundles.

Change is difficult, and switching communication providers can cause people to worry. We don’t want prospective consumers wringing their hands when contemplating the switch to Verizon.

With this in mind, we’ve listened to our customers and are acting on their recommendations to help make it easier and more convenient for someone to drop their cable provider and order Verizon FiOS.

Starting today, all new FiOS customers can get a FiOS bundle on a month-to-month basis at the same prices charged to customers with a term contract, plus get price protection for one year without incurring an early termination fee.

In addition, customers who order our two-year FiOS bundle contracts for longer term price protection will now also receive a 30-day FiOS Worry-Free guarantee.  This means that new customers can take advantage of a risk-free guarantee, enabling them to cancel their service within 30 days of the date of activation, with no termination fee.

Call it our way of allowing people to kick the tires and make sure they like what they bought.

So why make this change now? We’ve looked at market reactions over the past several months, and it’s clear to us that some potential FiOS customers worry about making a two-year commitment without a penalty-free period during which they can change their minds.  Some customers have also said they simply need some service reassurances during the early transition period from their cable provider.  

Our new offer allows consumers to test drive FiOS and experience the difference for themselves with no anxiety over making a blind commitment to contracts or getting used to FiOS.

We believe consumer response to our new friendlier approach will be well received.  So go ahead and order FiOS if it’s available where you live, and kick the tires.  We bet you’ll like the smooth ride and wind in the hair feeling FiOS delivers, and you won’t ever want to turn back to cable.

[#2]

Every month, in my bill, I get a solicitation for Fios phone, internet, and tv for $99.99 per month for two years.  It comes in a bill for Fios phone, internet and tv that is $235.29.

Give me a break!!!  Please stop sending the ad or change my bill to $99.99.

Thank-you

[#3]

timandmarian,

As with all home-entertainment offers, $99.99 is the base price of one of three triple-play bundles we offer.  There is no way to predict that what each customer wants in advance such as the number of HD channels, number of set-top boxes, premium channel choices like movies or sports, for example.  And local taxes and fees will obviously differ from market to market. 

We can check your account to see if you're getting the bundle that best meets your needs.  Just send me a private message (not here in the public comments section) in the Verizon Community Forums with your home phone number or account number.  Thanks, and thank you for being a FiOS customer.

Bill

[#4]

I think this is great news to allow the month to month plus allow the trial period.

I think the only other hurdle Verizon needs to get over is how much taxes one would incur with FIOS.   Time and time again the question comes up on the Forums.  Friends and family come to my home are amazed at the picture quality of my FIOS TV but their concern is always what the taxes will be.  I don't have the phone service so I cannot answer their questions but I do share the costs I pay for my service.

[#5]

I'm disappointed with Verizon's recent change, which is very un-customer friendly to your customers who use Tivo with your FIOS service.  Verizon has added a flag to their digital signal that tells Tivo and similar DVR devices to prohibit copying of the recordings from one device to another.

See my thread on the issue here
http://forums.verizon.com/t5/FiOS-TV-Technical-Assistance/FIOS-TV-cable-card-issues-with-Tivo-and-mu...

This is making me consider dropping Verizon FIOS.  Verizon has turned an amazing FIOS experience into yet another utility company disappointment. 

[#6]

Bill, could you please comment on the issue I mentioned above?

[#7]

jumpin68ny,

Happy to hear that you like the sound of the new offer and that your FiOS TV picture is the envy of the neighborhood (but of course!).  You're right that our bills contain some taxes and fees imposed by local, state and federal agencies -- and not by Verizon.  When customers order FiOS service, our reps will quote the total of the estimated first bill, including  taxes and fees, as they recap the sale.  We will then send the customer an email that shows the estimated first bill charges as well as the average monthly charges.  If we don't have the customer's email address, we'll send a hard copy via U.S. mail.  This way, our new customers can see which services they've ordered and how much they can expect to pay for them.

Bill

[#8]

mga,

We didn't make any changes that are intended to interrupt your TiVo multi-room capability.  Please let us know which specific channels have been impacted, and we'll investigate this further and reply to you here.

Bill

[#9]

Bill, here is a small sampling of channels that I've personally verified and been effected by. 

130 APL
142 LRW
192 CURRENT
569 HDNET
574 ESPN2 HD
620 Discovery Channel HD
628 HSTRYHD
665 HGTVD
685 BRAVO HD

Other customers on the TivoCommunity thread have reported other channels. 

http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=450307

[#10]

Anyone transitioning from another provider that uses their DVR to record lots of programs will probably leave because of the low amount of record space. 20 hours of HD is not enough. I would have gone back to the other guys had I known. No end in sight on this problem for anyone reading this post. They always say next quarter but don't hold your breath.

[#11]

Bill,

Has any progress been made in the investigation into the channels I listed? 

Thanks

[#12]

Bill,

I know this is not the right forum for this but I am at a loss of how else to move forward after talking to well over 50 people at Verizon - across a variety of groups. This is really a case of the most horrid service at the worst possible time and I hope as someone concerned with how Verizon is portrayed you can do something to help me here.

I subscribed the Verizon FIOS Triple Play over the web subscribing to a promotion of 94.99 per month for the middle tier package. I was also porting my phone number from my cable company. This was on 6/13/2010. An appointment was scheduled for 6/22/2010 to setup the service. On 6/18/2010 - I spoke to a representative to confirm the appointment and was told that the online application sometimes messes things up and that the number port wasn't in the order and that I was assigned a different number. She did offer to fix this and put in a second order for my original number to be ported and assigned to my account. An appointment was setup for 6/28/2010 to do this.

On 6/22 - the techs came and setup service and everything worked fine until 6/28. On 6/28 since I hadn't heard from anyone I called into Verizon in the evening and asked them what was going on with the port. I was told it should be live in a few hours. Well what happened in a few hours is my phone went dead. It stayed that way until 6/30 when a tech came out and I now had my original number and I thought everything was good. Well not quite.

I was informed my the tech that I had two Verizon accounts, one with the Triple Play and the new number and a second account with just FIOS phone with the ported number. I was told I had to call the orders group to fix this. So on 7/1/2010 I called the Orders group and spent about two hours on the phone. After not hearing from the rep who had me on hold for about an hour - I hung up and tried to call back only to find out the phone was dead again. Its been dead ever since - today being 7/6.

Since then I have been told multiple times it will be resolved within a few hours, I will be called back at specific times etc. Etc. None of which has happened. Just one representative actually called me back after they promised to do so. Everyone else seems like they could careless. If you respond I would be glad to provide you with my cellphone number and the numbers above so that you can look at the record and see how many times I have had to call in and still got no where.

I have even called to cancel my account and not been able to do that. The person I spoke to simply dropped me in the Tech Support queue and I have had to go back over the story above countless times. Bottomline is I have no phone service for 5 days now. (I know this is not Verizon's problem) but I am having to deal with this while also having a new born and a death in the family. But instead of taking care of my family at this point I am spending hours on end talking to Verizon and still getting nowhere. What worries me the most is I have no ability to call 911 if we have an emergency given the newborn in the house.

Anyways I am at a loss right now how to get things to work - like I said I can't seem to even cancel my account. I am annoyed but more importantly I don't know what else to do and just need working service so that I can worry about things I really need to take care of.

[#13]

mga,

Sorry for the delay in responding, but there's nothing else to add beyond what I said on June 22.  Sorry I can't be of help.

Bill