I have been living at my current address for three years, with not an OUNCE of spam mail. Everything I signed up for goes straight to POBox. Verizon had a rather tempting triple play offer, so I figured, "I don't know why they are so hard up on providing phone service, but if I get more for less than double play, why not? I won't even use the phone." It wound up costing me 3 dollars more a month to get triple play, vs double play, because I chose to pay an extra $4/month to have my information unlisted. Still a good deal (even though I was a bit peeved I had to pay extra for them NOT to list my info).
As soon as I did sign up for the triple play, spam started coming to my physical address with the same misspelled street address as on my fios bill.
I guess the +$4/month doesn't cover spam mail to my physical address (makes sense, phonebook only, I get it) and this is why VZ is so hardup on making you sign up for a phone, so they can make money selling your info. I've tried to read the privacy policy and did not see anything about selling my address to a mass distribution, only that they would use for the typical advertisements in your browser and to offer relevant products and services. A furniture catalog, not so relevant, but I guess that's where they'll point me to justify this. It's fine, I'm not a Privacy Policy decoder and I'm sure whatever I'm angry about is "clearly" written somewhere.
I'm just really appalled that VZ makes money off selling my info and really does not clearly state somewhere "Prepare to get blasted with spam". It wastes so much of my time signing up with the Do Not Mail registry and writing back to each catalog I receive to remove me from their mailing list. The junk has decreased considerably since then, but some junk is still trinkeling in.
TL;DR: I guess I'm just hoping two things come from this rant:
1) VZ makes it a little more clear that they'll sell your info to marketers
2) Warning for the next person who thinks the $4 more a month will give them privacy from anyone but the phonebook and that signing up for phone service won't have any drawbacks.
@NotYou wrote:I have been living at my current address for three years, with not an OUNCE of spam mail. Everything I signed up for goes straight to POBox. Verizon had a rather tempting triple play offer, so I figured, "I don't know why they are so hard up on providing phone service, but if I get more for less than double play, why not? I won't even use the phone." It wound up costing me 3 dollars more a month to get triple play, vs double play, because I chose to pay an extra $4/month to have my information unlisted. Still a good deal (even though I was a bit peeved I had to pay extra for them NOT to list my info).
As soon as I did sign up for the triple play, spam started coming to my physical address with the same misspelled street address as on my fios bill.
I guess the +$4/month doesn't cover spam mail to my physical address (makes sense, phonebook only, I get it) and this is why VZ is so hardup on making you sign up for a phone, so they can make money selling your info. I've tried to read the privacy policy and did not see anything about selling my address to a mass distribution, only that they would use for the typical advertisements in your browser and to offer relevant products and services. A furniture catalog, not so relevant, but I guess that's where they'll point me to justify this. It's fine, I'm not a Privacy Policy decoder and I'm sure whatever I'm angry about is "clearly" written somewhere.
I'm just really appalled that VZ makes money off selling my info and really does not clearly state somewhere "Prepare to get blasted with spam". It wastes so much of my time signing up with the Do Not Mail registry and writing back to each catalog I receive to remove me from their mailing list. The junk has decreased considerably since then, but some junk is still trinkeling in.
TL;DR: I guess I'm just hoping two things come from this rant:
1) VZ makes it a little more clear that they'll sell your info to marketers
2) Warning for the next person who thinks the $4 more a month will give them privacy from anyone but the phonebook and that signing up for phone service won't have any drawbacks.
There is a line in the privacy policy that does say that 3rd parties will get your information. All you need to do is contact them and opt out.
Like I said, I'm sure it's in there. Can you show me the line? I want to know what to look for, for next time.
Start a new topic or ask questions in the open forum.
