Verizon Swap Scam; Alert

[BRICAR22]

VERIZON’s SWAP SCAM:

I am relaying the following situation as a form of “public
service announcement” or a “Verizon wireless customer – warning”; however you
want to read this.

History of situation:
I had an iPhone 6s (BTW – I don’t care about Apple or Blackberry or Android
devices – they are a means to an end and nothing else) and it was having a
terrible time holding a charge. The battery would charge quickly but drain equally
quickly.

I called Verizon tech support (since I pay for the insurance
coverage) and ask if I can get a new battery or … and they go through a deluge
of investigative activities – culminating in “them telling me” to send the
phone and they will swap it out with a refurbished one, etc. They tell me NOT
to go to Apple to get a new battery – because “you paid for the insurance – you
might as well use it.”

I go to the iCloud “thing” and back up my phone info; and
await the replacement phone.

The replacement phone arrives a few days later via FedEx,
and so I swap my SIM card, do all the stuff one needs to do to flip my phone
profile, reconnect to the business email, etc and I put my old phone in the same
exact packaging that they sent the replacement phone in; and it gets sent out
through UPS. Thought it was strange that they ship it to me with FedEx and
provide a UPS return label – but I’m not Verizon and they must know what they
are doing.

Current Situation:
Few weeks go by and then on Saturday (9/22/2018) I receive an email that my
phone does not qualify for the manufacturer’s warranty and so they are going to
charge me $329 as a form of penalty for trying to scam them. Of course this
perks my interest (in a way that is not something that people usually want to
perk my interest) and I call Verizon to get the details on what this is all
about.

Verizon tells me that the phone (remember – it had a battery
drain problem) was received and that it had a “crack in the upper left corner
of the screen”. Now – one doesn’t have to know much about me to know that a
cracked screen is something that I would quickly notice and consider replacing
by buying a new phone or a new screen – OR SOMETHING. However, I WOULD NOT call
Verizon and tell them that I had a battery draining problem – and then sent
them a phone with a cracked screen, expecting that they wouldn’t notice.

So I tell the customer “care” person of Verizon that the
phone DID NOT have a cracked screen when I put it into the box and shipped it
back – so that must have occurred in route or while it was in their chain of
custody.

“Oh – we understand, [removed] … but we have no evidence
that it was damaged in route to our receiving warehouse, nor when it was
unpacked and sent to the return office.” Remarked the Verizon “person”.

To which I said – “it was NOT damaged when I sent it to you,
and so it could only have been damaged while in the hands of the shipper or
your internal handling department.”

To which he remarked almost verbatim what he has said
before.

At that point it was clear that he was calling me either (1)
a lying SOB that had the mission of scamming Verizon to replace an iPhone 6S
with a refurbished iPhone 6S by telling them I had a battery drain problem when
actually it was a cracked screen; or (2) I am so frickin stupid that I didn’t
see a cracked screen and returned it blind to the fact that it was damaged; or
(3) I am a lying SOB and too [removed] stupid to think that they wouldn’t notice
a cracked screen as I return it because I made up the story of the draining
battery.

I therefore told him these scenarios – with rich verbiage
that is not worth repeating, and told him that Verizon MUST be looking for some
side funds – and to develop a crappy reputation.

I then told him that if there is no way to remove the $329
penalty for returning a phone that THEY said did not qualify for the
manufacturer’s warranty, due to neglect (that they blamed on ME), then I want
to have the phone returned to me – not caring what the cost is for shipping,
etc.. To which HE said – that is NOT verizon’s policy.

So – let’s get this straight (I remarked).

1. verizon tech support tells me that in order to
   fix a draining battery I MUST return the phone and get it replaced. They
   discouraged me from going to Apple to just get the battery replaced.

1. verizon sends me a phone with the replacement “agreement”
   that says I pay $329 for the replacement IF the phone does not meet the
   manufacturer’s warranty for replacement;

1. I send the phone back to verizon in the same
   packaging that was sent to me;

1. verizon receives the phone; tells me the phone
   was damaged; charges me $329 and KEEPS THE PHONE.

LESSON TO BE LEARNED: Since I am cancelling my verizon contract,
this is not for me to learn – but for those that have read this far. If you
find that there is a problem with your phone and you have verizon – then BEFORE
YOU SEND THE BAD PHONE BACK, take a picture of your phone as it lays on that
day’s newspaper so there is NO way that it can be said to be damaged before you
sent it – OR – you can go to a verizon store with the bad phone and the
packaging and take a picture of a store associate HOLDING the phone and the
packaging WITH that day’s newspaper.

DO NOT SEND vERIZON your phone without a high degree of
protective evidence that you can shove in their face when they run the SWAP
SCAM on you.

In all things – good luck – I’m going back to T-Mobile …
ciao.

Content modified as required by Verizon Wireless Terms of Service​

[glitchedpixel]

You do know fraud is very common in the cell phone industry, right? How, may I ask, is an agent sitting at a desk hundreds of miles from you supposed to know what condition the phone was sent?

[deloused]

Yeah sounds like you're a scammer. Good luck with TMobile since they have the same policies in effect!

[Gale123Moon]

Yes, they are criminals.

[Gale123Moon]

Verizon has scammed us too. Many hundreds of dollars. They make you ask the same question over and over. 

[KH-OrnEsh]

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