I have been a customer for 15+ years. My wife 17+. We pay our bills on time and occasionally upgrade our devices. Neither of us much care for
the 'latest gadget' and are never in a hurry to upgrade. We conduct virtually all of our transactions online and are familiar with the trade-in program.
Within the last two weeks we were both notified by pop-ups that we could get an iPhone 7 'for free'. We could not seem to complete the transaction online as the website did not reflect the correct trade in value for our current devices. We spoke to (what we thought) was a helpful agent who told us there was a 'glitch in the system' and completed in for us.
We have each received our new 256GB iPhone 7 phones and had to call in today to figure our how to return the old units as there wasn't a return label/package included. That's when the wheels came off the bus.
After 90 minutes of speaking with two agents and a supervisor -without knowing exactly what the problem was - I was able to complete the return for my 5S with the appropriate credit, but when it came to the $650 credit for my wife's iPhone 6 our call was suddenly dropped. Not in the middle of anything heated, just dropped. No attempt was made to contact us. Really. Both of our cell phones were on, we were using our home phone, even our two email addresses were available for contact yet when I called back in I was told "return call went to voice mail.' Blatantly not true. I feel this was a deliberate 'pass the buck'.
We called back in and spent 2.5 HOURS on the phone and were told that my wife's phone was not eligible for the $650 credit because she upgraded 1 month early. We were SPECIFICALLY told by the original agent that would not be an issue. We could've easily waited a couple of weeks if it were. It seems the only option now is to return the phone she has already registered, reactivate her old phone, open a customer service case so that (theoretically) she'll be fully refunded - just so that in 3 weeks she can be shipped another identical phone which will receive the rebate.
What a load of crap.
I joined this forum because escalation over the phone to a 'supervisor' was hardly an ideal solution. I have the exact time, date and name of the agent who gave us this bad information. The 'form 360' to make a complaint is insufficient. In fact the original agent pointedly told us several times that the call was being recorded and she wouldn't misrepresent anything because of it. I invite VZW to pull the call and review it - we are being completely honest about this. This is 'bait and switch' pure and simple and I would like to know who I can contact to file a real, formal complaint. I am now tied to a carrier I would prefer to utterly ditch after nearly two decades - all due to their absolutely horrible customer service. Mea culpa isn't cutting it. I want to escalate and make a formal complaint in writing to someone who can review this and tell me how they will salvage the situation. Again, bait and switch intention or otherwise. If the original agent made an honest mistake but now we are committed to a carrier we are EXTREMELY unhappy with.
We could have just bought the damned phones for full retail if they were that important to us. Talk about gratuitously psissing off two long term, very good customers who were only trying to spend money and take advantage of the offers that YOU sent us.
