VZW Taking Advantage of Elderly Customers
rwascak
Enthusiast - Level 1

On 2/6/2011 my son helped me attempt to 'upgrade' my residential DSL connection that was slow at 768Kbps.  With his help (he is a Senior Network Engineer for KPMG) and much discussion about the much greater speeds I could achieve by switching my ISP to Comcast or waiting even longer for the Fios service to become available on our street (the VZW contractor laid lines and a number of in ground boxes that were said to be for VZW's Fios, I was told this when they needed to use my private land to bury on of these boxes on my property by the contractor).  Despite my sons very persistent suggestions I didn't want to switch over to Comcast, which he called "the lesser of the two evils."  

I did need a bump in my download speed as I he bought me an Apple TV for Christmas and the 768Kbps could no where near handle any sort of streaming through the Apple TV's Netflix embedded application.  With his advice and that we both thought it would be easier and more expeditious I attempted this online.  This is where VZW began to not only misrepresent themselves through their customer service to this point they have lied and basically defrauded me.

The VZW representative that I thought would have been conveniently helpful via chat made it known that to upgrade my internet speed from the 768Kbps I had to the highest rate offered by VZW (4-7Mbps) I would have to bundle it with a telephone service I absolutely had no need for.  Previous to this 'upgrade' I was paying $96.02 per month.  I was quoted and signed up for a rate of $65.99 per month before taxes.  This was an outright lie.

I have logged into my account today and my next monthly bill due is know $103.40 I have additional phone service which I never wanted and my internet bandwidth rate stays at 768Kbps. 

I spent nearly 3 hours on the internet and phone trying to find out when Fios would be available and with Comcast for options besides this ridiculously slow 768Kbps DSL connection, I was then lied to at many different points during the overly aggressive VZW sales process only to by left with services I don't need and according to www.speedtest.net an internet speed slightly SLOWER than before I upgraded.

Currently I could not even get on this forum with my current internet connection speed while I am hardwired into the VZW provided modem.  I had to tether my sons AT&T iPhone to even gain access to this forum.

This pathetically sad behavior of, in my opinion, taking advantage of an older consumer by aggressively pushing these "Bundles" which they say some services cannot be gained outside of said bundle, is irreprehensible.  As I signed up for a 1-year subscription, these same Chat Representatives told me I could not or I would be fined and could face criminal penalties should I pursue the matter.  I should have listened to my son and gone with the “lesser of two evils."

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Re: VZW Taking Advantage of Elderly Customers
smith6612
Community Leader
Community Leader
Be aware that VZ and VZW are separate companies. VZ is the company that sells DSL and FiOS. VZW sells Wireless products.

We need to check your modem Transceiver Statistics first of all to make sure the line itself can physically hold the 4-7Mbps package, and if it is even trying to sync at the speeds for the package. If you tell us what model modem Verizon provided you with, that would help in telling you how to get these statistics.

If the Fiber Optic cabling for FiOS was already laid past your home, I would check neighbors' addresses against Verizon's Availability checker to see if it can even be ordered. I would also get someone in Verizon Engineering to check if it can even be ordered, or if any progress is being made if the cables were ran some time ago. If the cables they ran were not cables for FiOS though, it's going to be tough getting them to hook you up and I feel it's going to be a long wait. I've been waiting for FiOS for a little over 5 years now and it hasn't shown up. Just stopped two miles from here a year ago and they haven't built anything since. They won't be building any new areas in 2011 either.
Re: VZW Taking Advantage of Elderly Customers
Shamika_VZ
Contributor - Level 3
Hello rwascak,

I can definitely see the frustration here and I do apologize for any inconveniences this has caused. I sent you a private message to further assist.

Shamika_Vz Verizon Support

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