i was rejected after 10 years

I don't know why some people think being a long time customer guarantees some type of perks.

Business is business, profit is profit. If a long time customer leaves a company they will be replaced by 3 new ones. Smaller companies worry about customer loyalty, mega giants don't give a damn.

 

What the OP is going through isn't unique, I've seen this situation happen more than once.

Pool_Shark: This is exactly the type of stigma that can cripple a company (Sprint's customer service anyone?), and that kind of stink can take years to get rid of. When I was a kid, my father had one or two negative experiences with Sears, and he refused to back to them for decades. I learned of this when my wife and I bought a fridge from them a few years back. During my experience, everyone I dealt with at Sears was practically BEGGING me to rate their customer service as a 10 out of 10, and made more than clear that giving them anything less was failure on their part. It takes a long time for the mega giants to figure it out; I'd wager Verizon is years away from that point as they're still the biggest (AT&T merger not withstanding), but these things add up.

 

So was your phone not broken? I'm missing some of the conversation here. You're told you can get an upgrade because of why? You go check out the phones. Call VZW back and they say now...why?

 

This is why competition is good (and why the AT&T merger is prob bad). Less choice, more go F yourselfs to the customers. This is compounded with long-term contracts, coverage difference, incompatible hardware, and the hassle of switching to another carrier.

We're basically screwed - you often just have to assume the position and take it. But, I've only had Verizon for years (back to the the brick-sized analog cell phones). Is the grass greener somewhere else?

 

Verizon knows they have the best service, they couldn't care less how we feel. Yes, in time, it may come back to haunt them, just like GM. But as long as they keep their service top notch and keep putting out devices that customers want, they will do what they want when they want. Which is exactly why I no longer sign contracts with them, I want to be able to leave whenever I want, if/when one of the other companies can match their service.

 

Not sure I fully get the "I want to leave whenever I want" statement. You can absolutely do that right now, even with a contract. You just have to pay the early termination fee. Verizon doesn't have a ball and chain on you.

I see people all the time pay full price for a phone, when usually the contract price + early termination fee equals the out of contract price. I'd much rather hedge against the risk that I'll stay with the same carrier throught the contract than pay upfront. Just doens't make too much sense to me so what is the advantage.

Seriously, someone tell me what I'm missing.

As for the OP, try calling again, tell them you phone is broken and keep trying until you get a sympathetic CSR.

 

All I have to pay is the $350 ETF that's cut down $10/month to leave the contract?

 

His point is that often the ETF + the discounted contract purchase price of the phone is approximately equal to the actual retail value of the phone, if you're buying the top-end phones.

So, hedging your bets by signing a contract (that is, taking advantage of the discount with the assumption that you'll probably stay with them), isn't a bad idea because the cost of terminating is about equal to buying the phone outright.

 

A couple of reasons I wouldn't pay the ETF.

First, (like quite a few others) I am grandfathered on unlimited data. If I pay the ETF that's gone forever.

Second, I got in on the promo last fall where all my family plans lines have unlimited data, each pays the $30 for it, then get's a $20 discount effectively giving us unlimited data for $10 a line. I asked how long it was good for and their computers show it good through 2035. There's no way I'm gonna risk losing that.

If you signed up with VZW after tiered data went into effect, then yeah it's probably worth it to just pay the ETF. But that is the reason why some don't have that option.

 

Just keep on calling back and keep talking to reps till you get what you want, or do as Steven58 said. That's what I did when I wanted to upgrade with only a 1 year contract, I negotiated a price of $70 more than what normal two year subsidized pricing was. I'll do the same when it's time to upgrade again.

 

alternate option: with the launch of the bionic there are loads of people unloading charges, thunderbolts, and just about everything else for reasonable prices.

 

Call customer service and ask them how much your ETF is. They'll ask why, tell them your phone is broken and your thinking about going to AT&T and you want to figure out if it was cheaper to pay the ETF or just wait till the end of your contract to cancel. You can even ask questions about what you have to do to port your number (even though you may already know the answer).

I'm almost certain they'll offer you an early upgrade if you play your cards right.

 

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This is probably the most important thing. The sense of entitlement (when people would give me the lines I'm a loyal customer, I've been a customer for 10 years) was my biggest pet peeve. I heard that everyday and just didn't care. Reps get paid the same if you cancel or not. My only incentive for helping someone was personal satisfaction, no one wants to help a jerk.

Like it or not that was the reality of the job. I didn't last long as a rep as many others don't either. It was thankless and low paying, it was easy to move on.

 

Are you absolutely sure the phone is out of warranty? I'd check the manual for how long it is just to be sure. I know mine is one year but some states have different laws so yours may be longer. To be honest insurance isn't a bad thing to buy, at least for the first year or so when getting an expensive new smart phone, you can cancel it at any time.
Just be aware that if you cancel service you will probably have to pay a early termination fee if your contract isn't expired.

 

Your not the only one, I'm currently fighting this fight as well as another one with VZW atm, got hun up on once and hoping to hear back from the manager of Revenue management tom...

Basically I was told I wasn't allowed to upgrade to a 4g device and right now my DX is all jacked up, tried many a thing including talking to tier 3 tech support to try and fix it...no go

So as alternative I am trying to going and place the new phone I want on my bill and upgrade and sign a 2 year agreement, my contract is up in December the 28th to be exact, and because I fell onto hard times when I was injured at work and off the job for 3 months I missed one payment and my phone was shut off for 2 hours before I paid my bill, first time in 7 years that I had that issue..no sympathy no nothing, the thing that makes me mad though is getting different conflicting information over the past few days from different managers, supervisors, CSS's and the list goes on and on...

I'm going to talk to my buddy about crapt&t if I can see what they can do for me, but we shall see I'm looking at options but I don't want to lose my unlimited data and there ARE cheaper options out there for me....gotta love free-market systems

 

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His last comment was referring to what you said about outsourcing.

As far as outsourcing I don't quite no what you are referring to either. Outsourcing usually means a company is subcontracting another company to handle an aspect of their business. We all understand that Verizon has not been outsourcing to other countries, & we just kinda figured that you guys are Verizon employees. But what I believe Steven meant when telling the OP to go to the loyalty department and get a supervisor, was that they would have authority to resolve the situation rather than the CSRs who are first to take the call.

You mentioned that they're mostly the same. But when I've had a real issue, I usually get transferred to another department, whether level 2 tech or customer loyalty/retention. If they were the same there should be no reason why they couldn't handle it.