This is a complaint against Verizon FIOS for the improper handling of our account which has adversely affected our credit rating. We recently received a notice from a collection agency for a debt that we had tried to pay but that Verizon had insisted was already paid. On 12/27 we cancelled our Verizon FIOS services. The service was poor, customer service even worse, bills were always incorrect and the cost was much higher than advertised. We received the final bill for those services and paid this bill in full and telephoned Verizon to ask about the early termination fee of $199 that was not included on this bill. We were told this charge would be billed separately. The next, and only other bill we received from Verizon, was dated 3/7. Page 1 of this bill stated FINAL BILL This final bill may have already been referred to an outside collection agency. Pay your bill online at Verizon.com/payfinalbill. Upon receiving this bill, with threat of a collection agency, we immediately went to the website as indicated to pay. The webpage continuously returned the error message that they were unable to process request at this time. We tried to access our Verizon online account to pay but no longer had access that account online either. We tried to pay the bill over the phone but the phone system was unable to process the request because the account number was not recognized. Over the next week we sent several e-mails and spent at least 8 hours either on the phone or on hold trying to determine the correct account number in order to pay this bill. On 3/17 we reached Pam at a customer service center in Florida who was able to connect us to Crystal in Financial Services. Crystal informed us that she had located the bill but that the account number and payment address were different than the one printed on the bill we had received which is why we could not use the online or phone payment methods. We would have to mail in the payment. She assured us that she would send out another bill with the correct account number and payment address.in addition, she would adjust the due date to provide time to receive the new bill statement and make payment. When we had not received a new bill by 3/24 we telephoned Verizon Customer Service again. On 3/24 we spoke to Mr. Smith in FIOS Billing at 800-688-2880. He insisted that the reason we had not received a statement was because this bill had been paid in full. We explained to him that we had not paid this bill. He again insisted that it was already paid and we should just “consider this our lucky day”! Clearly the support staff in all areas of Verizon that we dealt with lacked the knowledge or training to properly assist customers. We have made payment to the Collection Company of America for this debt. However, we are dismayed at the way Verizon has handled their customers. We spent countless hours trying to resolve this bill with Verizon in good faith. Verizon failed to properly train their staff to understand the computerized accounting system and online services and thus were unable to properly assist us. We were provided with incorrect information and as a result Verizon sent this debt to a collection agency which has adversely affected our credit score. Verizon had made it near impossible to even provide payment when warranted. We received only one bill dated 3/7 which we received at some point after 3/7 and this debt record had apparently been forwarded to a collection agency by 3/24 which was hardly enough time to make payment especially when 2 out of 3 payment options did not function properly.
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