Store complaint - 880 old country road, garden city ny 12530

[KaydianB]

I had an awful experience trying to completing my upgrade trade at this store and believe I was the victim of an unethical practice committed by a Verizon employee. His name is Joe and he was working the afternoon of 11/8/2024 2:30pm standing at the store entrance when I entered the store. He was wearing the holiday shirt with colorful design.
I entered the store at around 2:30PM Friday November 8 to complete a trade in of my iPhone 13, after upgrading to the iPhone 16 online. The confirmed trade in promotion was valued at $999 over 36 months. I was met at the door by an employee who later told me his name was Joe. I showed Joe the trade in directions I received from Verizon via email and gave him my cell phone number. He took my phone to the back of the store for a few minutes then told me he could not complete the trade in due to some system error and sent me a text request to gain access to my account which I allowed. He then took my phone to the back again and I immediately received 2 emails from Verizon saying my trade in submission was canceled at 2:43pm and 2:46pm. Joe never received my permission to cancel the trade in. He then came back to me with a sheet of paper saying he gave me a trade in of $245. I told him I didn’t not receive a confirmation the trade in was completed and asked why it was canceled. He got very rude and dismissive of my concerns. I then received an email from Verizon at 2:49PM saying because my trade in was not complete, I would be charged for the trade in value promotion and would be required to pay full price for the iPhone 16. I got very suspicious and would not leave the store without my iPhone 13 if the trade in was not completed on Verizon’s end due to whatever this employee had done to my account when access was granted. I then had to call Verizon customer service and threatened to call the police because cancelling my trade in and keeping my phone is theft. When I asked to take a picture of “Joes” name tag he would not allow me to, then he said he would go get my phone and give it back to me. He was gone for about 10 minutes and handed me a business card and a phone that was not mine (it had a soccer sticker on the case) my phone was blue and caseless. He went to the back of the store again and returned with my phone. This was probably closer to 3:10pm -3:30pm.

After leaving the store I immediately pulled up my Myverizon app (documents and receipts) and saw that the employee put through 2 Transfer Number request with trade in value of $245 for my iPhone 13, the location number on each receipt was E105801 and Rep ID E2NXC. There was also a 3rd document a Purchase Receipt with trade in value of $245 and showed a gift card for trade in at $0. The third receipt listed Verizon Specialist as Jocelyn, however I did not speak to or interact with a Joycelyn in store. The time stamp of the receipt was 11/08/2024 7:44UTC.

 At 5:11pm I received a call from and unknown number saying my Verizon account was locked (very fishy coincidence) which I believe he may be involved with because I have never had a call like this before. I am also concerned about what information he accessed in the time I granted him access to my account, and if he in fact tried to transfer my number?

Wondering how I can get in contact with the district manager. And also if there is anyway to tell what this employee did when he was granted access to my account?

[Cjgriffin]

Try contacting a manager at another location and see if they can give you the phone number for the district manager. Every time I call a Verizon help line it goes to a call center in another country. 

[vzw_customer_support]

We are sorry to read that you had this experience as this is never what we want for any of our customers. We will make sure to forward your feedback to our team, and if you need any assistance with your account, let us know.

~Freddy