New Account (Fraud) Limbo

[TD74]

Trying here as a last resort. My mother in law ordered a new phone, tablet and watch as part of a holiday promotion. She was with another carrier and went through the process of porting her number to Verizon. Her former carrier released the number and closed her account. Only, Verizon has yet to activate the new phone etc. They seem to feel there may be fraud, which I can understand to a degree. My mother in law lives in another state and is up for the holidays. She placed the order online and had the phone etc shipped to my house where she is staying. This seems to have thrown Verizon into a tizzy. Again understandable….to a degree. However…my mother in law has called a half dozen times, gotten bounced around from rep to rep and even disconnected on several times. She is not receiving ANY help in resolving this. One rep told her to go to a local Verizon store. Which she did. Only to be told they can’t help her. Her old phone is shut off, the old number ported to Verizon but obviously not activated.  She has no phone or ability to call anyone. To make matters worse, she is battling brain cancer and cannot communicate with her doctors as they cannot reach her. My wife has been trying to help her mom with this daily and it’s to the point where it’s causing so much unnecessary grief and stress. I figured I’d try here. Is there a corporate office for customer issues that are not getting resolved? Due to my mother in laws health situation, her not having a phone is now posing a serious problem.  Verizon’s handling of this has been abysmal. 

[vzw_customer_support · Accepted solution]

Hello TD74. We're very sorry to hear about your mother-in-law's situation. We recommend for her to reach out to our fraud prevention team to see if they can help with the situation. Their number is 1-888-483-7200. Hours of operation: Sun-Sat 8am-12 am ET. 

~Ivone

[TD74]

Thanks ivone. She has tried this to no avail. They told her to go to a local store to have her identity verified. She went (in a wheelchair) and was told they couldn’t help her. The right hand is not talking to the left hand at Verizon. Calling customer service has been useless. It’s hours on the phone, being transferred to other reps and even being disconnected.  Is there not an escalation department at Verizon to handle issues that are urgent? 

[timclai21]

Having the exact same issue. Just got new phone in today and the service is suspended due to suspicious calls but I can’t resume the service and customer service is absolutely useless. I just want the line unsuspended so I can use the phone.

[TD74]

It’s just beyond insane how customer service is useless. I fully understand the need to take fraud seriously and im glad to see they have such a commitment to it. However, they are doing absolutely nothing to help get a resolution.  In the meantime, my mother in law has no phone, Verizon is sitting on her old number that was ported over and they refuse to assist her. She cannot from her doctors and is cut off from the rest of the world. Not a good situation. She’s battling brain cancer. It’s incomprehensible. 

[SynthpopAddict]

Has anyone tried calling Verizon's Porting Department at 888-844-7095?  If the phone is using an eSIM, sometimes those have to be manually activated - seems to happen more often with the latest iPhones from what I've read in the forums.

Here are instructions on how to activate a new phone yourself, in case you haven't tried:

Activate Device 

Sending you and your mother-in-law kind thoughts.

[TD74]

Thank you very much and for the kind words! Yes we tried that but the circle of being transferred around never ends. I ended up contacting the corporate executive offices and finally getting some help!!!  With that said, the customer service dept over the phone is horrendous. I’ve been a Verizon wireless customer for 21 years and this just floored me. 

[vzw_customer_support]

Hey TD74, I am sorry that this has not been resolved. I would like to look more into this with you. When is a good time we can open a secure chat and look this over together?

-Harry

[TD74]

I was able to get this resolved by reaching out to corporate. It’s really ridiculous I had to even do that. The regular customer service at Verizon is totally useless and the absolute worst I have ever encountered. Incompetence on level 11.