Verizon Landline (need advice)

[loviedovie]

Also I would point out that all of the wisdom of these forums seems to suggest that you do a PFD before attempting a GW delete. In other words, offer to pay them in full in exchange for getting the delinquency deleted from your history. You must have this in writing before you proceed or it is not effective.

Another method I rarely see discussed, but I found somewhere on here that worked for someone is called "RESTRICTIVE ENDORSEMENT." I am cut and pasting what I read on that here (apologies, I did not note who the poster was or when):

Restrictive Endorsements

"To all those ca's that did not respond to my requests for PFD's (after writing twice) or answered my PFD's letters with phone calls promising to remove account with oral promise, I sent them a personal check with restrictive endorsement. The letter accompanying the check served as the restrictive endorsement, stating that if they cash the check, they agree to remove from credit reports. It was a gamble. It I sent payment anyway because I owed them money after not keeping my end of a legitimate business contract (let's face it: we're in this mess because we didn't pay money we owed...money still owed. There's a moral aspect to all this).
In the end, all CO's removed their accounts from my bureaus. Restrictive endorsements work and are usually binding under the uniform commercial code. Some states have legal precedent that invalidate restrictive endorsements (ny and cali) but for me, sending payment with a wishful restrictive endorsement worked: I paid off legitimate financial obligations and the bonus was getting them off my reports. Some CO's may have deleted because they believed I would take them to court if they didn't delete or they were just generous."

[loviedovie]

I was very new to credit at the time so I just called up and paid my charge-off without requesting a PFD or trying Restrictive Endorsement. So my only option was to ask for a GW delete and it worked. But I think the wisdom of the forums would suggest you first try PFD because once you have paid them they have little reason to try to help you with anything since there is no money at stake for them. 

Good luck! Let us know what happens!

[Shogun]

On the restrictive endorsement, they must have been generous.  In my state you could put anything you want on the back, it doesn't matter.

[hificat]

OK, so I did some research on this yesterday, and what my acct shows is the collection amount being credited to my acct on 4/10/12, and my payment being made 5/16/12. I'm not sure how that can be, because as financially tight as things were when this all went down, I can't see myself making a payment on the acct if the past due had dropped off of it. I confirmed with my bank, that 5/16 is in fact the day I made the payment, but don't have a way to confirm when Verizon actually did the charge off, or when it would have shown up in my acct.

I'm feeling like this info has left me in a more tenuous position as far as getting this delete done.

Thanks everyone for your input.

[hificat]

Update on my situation:

Called today a number a member was generous enough to provide via PM. Even spoke to a person whose name starts with "M" that they said was very nice. Got nowhere. This person insisted the acct this charge had been from was closed, but I was talking to them on a phone on that account. I had switched from DSL, to cable modem last year around when this happened, but kept my landline that was on the same acct. This person offered me the typical "I can help you pay this bill, then it can show up as paid on your credit report", and I politely declined. 

Thinking about trying the BBB complaint route. Was wondering what everyone thought about that. 

Just a refesher, the bill was in fact late (less than 90 days), they sent me a letter asking me to pay the bill, about a week and change later, I went to my acct online, and paid about 2/3 of the entire amount (the full amount I owed still showed on my acct online), about a week or two later, I received a letter from collection agency, called the collection agaency a couple weeks later, then checked my acct, and the full amount had been credited back to my acct, so it had a negative balance. 

My contention is, they took money for payment on this bill THEN sent it to a collection agency. 

BBB complaint?

Update to update. I checked out the Verizon in my state on the BBB site, and they have a rating of "F". It shows there have been over 1500 complaints registered against them with the BBB in the last 3 years. Almost 500 of them for billing issues. Not sure if that means anything with my regards of getting a satisfactory resolution.

[hificat]

Update:

Got nowhere with the number I was given by a forum member, so I filed a complaint with the BBB. Received a call from Verizon within a couple days, but couldn't take call as I was at work. Got back to the person that called yesterday, and still no luck. Received her "offer" from the BBB today, which is I can pay the bill, and they will report it "paid" to credit rating agencies. I noticed in her response, that it said the amount was written off in 4/2012, I made a payment on it (which was about 2/3 of the total) in 5/2012, then it was referred to collection agency in 6/2012 AFTER I paid a substantial portion of it. Her response also says it was reprted to credit rating agencies by them in 8/2012. 

I responded that my position had not changed, as the person I spoke to admitted I made a payment in 5/2012 (both in writing and on the phone) BEFORE they referred the amount to CA. I also mentioned in my response that I thought it was strange that they reported it to credit agencies 2 months after they sold the debt to CA, and they didn't even own the debt anymore. 

Agent called my cell tonight, but I missed the call and she left a message that basically said Verizon's position hadn't changed, and that she never said they had "sold" the debt, but only that they had "referred" the debt to a CA for collection. What exactly does that mean?

So at this point, I'm ready to port my number over to Comcast, and stop being their customer. Is that a good or bad idea? 

I tried to be polite with the woman yesterday on the phone. Is that a bad idea? 

I'm cosidering contacting my State Representative's office for assistance with this, as well as my US Congressman's office. My US Congressman is a former customer of mine. 

Is there anything else I can do to make sure that this person from Verizon has my name kicking around in her head when she goes home from work at night? Maybe trying to reach out to her supervisor somehow? 

I have to say, as someone that is currently a customer with Verizon landline, it's a little hard to imagine they'd treat an existing customer this way. I'm a "techie" type person, and many people I know come to me for technichal advise. I can't imagine at this point EVER advising someone to go with Verizon DSL service, or a Verizon landline phone, so in some very small way, they've damaged they brand already.