DESPARATE FOR HELP!!!

[haulingthescoreup]

Just a general comment here:

Happy to see all the replies to this thread!

I'd just like to point out: if you read through the whole thread, OP has called her son to account on this matter. The current question is how she can negotiate a deal with Verizon.

Again, thanks for all the replies!

[Anonymous]

Hi, haulingthescoreup! Yeah, I read through the entire thread, but I don't see where the OP called her son to account on the matter. I see that she said she had his phone turned off; and I see that she said that if she could legally do it she'd make him sell his truck (which she probably can't legally do, it seems, since she allowed him to use the phone); but, other than that, I don't see where she called him to account.

Most of the posts here are saying that she needs to make her son pay for this. My advice to her was to take out a loan to pay it off and then have her son make payments on the loan (including interest), which he'd be able to do working part-time from college.

Either way, she needs a solution, since she said she can't make the payments Verizon wants. And she needs to get her son to pay for it, either in the short-term (miraculously) or in the long-term (by taking out a loan or some other means, such as refinancing his car).

Either way, it would be great to hear from the OP as to what happened with this. But I think the replies here are still valid, as she hasn't posted any resolution except that she turned his phone off. Nothing about him helping her to pay for it or whatever. (Would be good to know if she's at least still reading this thread! :-) )

[Anonymous]

I would like to tell you that you can do a settlement  with them they woud not like to lose you as a customer and see if Verizon Fios is in your area where you can have free US long distance and a thing that verizon offers called Talk to the World talk would defintely lower that bill

[Anonymous]

Thanks for all of the replys, it took me quite a while to read and digest them all. Unfortunately, verizon is not willing to lower their required payments and taking out a loan does not seem to be an option.  i havent figured out a solution yet, my son does now have a job but he only makes $6 an hour  so it will help but i will still have to make the payments and i really cant do that right now. As for my son being on my plan in the first place, he has been on my plan for the past 5 years and we have never had a problem. He takes care of his sister when im at work  on night shift (i work both day shift and night shift eveery week)  and so it was necessary for me to be sure that he had a phone.   HIS TRUCK TURNED OUT TO BE JUST ABOUT WORTHLESS!  It is a 1988  truck that was given to him by his father a a year ago.  Helpful suggestions and comments are greatly appreciated but hurtful comments about my parenting skills and failure to teach my children responsibility are quite counterproductive. i believe that i am a good parent to my children. I asked for advice but some of the comments have torn me down when i am doing the best that i can  with a bad situation.   

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Thanks for all of the replys, it took me quite a while to read and digest them all. Unfortunately, verizon is not willing to lower their required payments and taking out a loan does not seem to be an option.  i havent figured out a solution yet, my son does now have a job but he only makes $6 an hour  so it will help but i will still have to make the payments and i really cant do that right now. As for my son being on my plan in the first place, he has been on my plan for the past 5 years and we have never had a problem. He takes care of his sister when im at work  on night shift (i work both day shift and night shift eveery week)  and so it was necessary for me to be sure that he had a phone.   HIS TRUCK TURNED OUT TO BE JUST ABOUT WORTHLESS!  It is a 1988  truck that was given to him by his father a a year ago.  Helpful suggestions and comments are greatly appreciated but hurtful comments about my parenting skills and failure to teach my children responsibility are quite counterproductive. i believe that i am a good parent to my children. I asked for advice but some of the comments have torn me down when i am doing the best that i can  with a bad situation.   

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+1

If what you have to say does not benefit the OP by making suggestions on how she should deal with the bill, it is probably better left unsaid.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for checking in with us. I'm glad you were able to read the posts and give us an update. I was hoping for better news. I hope things work out for you!!!!

One ray of hope I'll leave you with. A long time back I had a phone bill from California that I neglected to pay when I moved to Texas. The bill finally went to a collection agency. The agency contacted me and told me that as long as I made regular payments to them, they wouldn't report it on my credit report. See, not putting it on my credit report was their leverage. So not reporting it was in both of our mutual interests.

Of course, that was just that one collection agency. There's no telling what might happen in your case. But maybe it's a ray of hope for you!

Sorry to hear that a loan isn't an option. I respect it if you don't want to get into more debt. But if it's just a case of thinking you wouldn't quality, I'd encourage you again to check out CitiFinancial or Wells Fargo Financial. High interest rates, but you'd probably get a loan. But if it's just something you don't want to do, then I respect that.

One last option would be to contact the FCC. A long shot for sure. But they might have a consumer complaint department. And since the FCC governs and licenses Verizon to use the airwaves, they might be able to do something. Shoot - just calling Verizon, speaking to a supervisor, and telling them you're GOING to contact the FCC might have some impact! I worked at a utility company once, and, any time a consumer threatened to contact the PUC we bent over for them. The last thing these companies want is trouble with their licensing commissions! I also once kept the phone company from shutting off my phone because I was late with a bill because I threatened to contact the PUC!

In fact, here's a web site that lists addresses you can complain at: http://www.consumersunion.org/campaigns/learn_more/001038indiv.html

I would contact the PUC and the FCC about Verizon. Tell them you're a long-standing customer with no history of not paying your bill, and all you're wanting is a payment plan that you can afford. Tell them you're a single mom who works nights and days with your son in college and a younger child, etc. Also explain how you got hit with this HUGE bill because of ignorance.

Really, Verizon should cut your bill in half as a courtesy. They've done it to others. I'd also contact the local paper, some online news sources, and try to get your story out. Verizon may give in when it becomes known what they're doing to you.

Last, I'd also send a very sweet letter to the Office of the President at Verizon, telling him your story in detail, and how you tried to work with customer service, but can't afford to pay it in 6 months, and if there's any way he can reduce your bill or give you more time to pay, etc. Might get some results. Again, I've had success contacting a company's Office of the President when all my attempts with customer service failed. They oftentimes have the bigger picture, whereas customer service agents can only see what they're told to do.

Anyway, hopefully there are some good suggestions. I would seriously try to get my story out there. Verizon treating a single mom this way who's doing her best to pay her bills and buy a house for her family isn't going to make them look good, and I think you can have some leverage if people become aware of your story! 

Good luck to you, and thanks for stopping by. Hope it all works out!!!

Here's one more link: http://boingboing.net/2007/07/31/att-iphone-intl-roam.html Guy had a similar situation to yours. He got a $3,000 cell phone bill, and got the whole thing waived because of "miscommunication" once it became public! So I would definitely let my story be known in as many places as possible. The fact that they're not at least cutting you a break here with the bill is atrocious!!

Good luck again. And let us know how it goes!!!

[Anonymous]

One other thought. You might want to find out from Verizon which collections it would go to after six months - their internal collections department or an outside collection agency. If it's their internal collections department, then you can call that department and ask them how it would work once your account got there. They probably have standard procedures. Could be that they might not report it to the credit bureaus if you work with them. As someone else here stated, phone companies aren't like banks or credit cards. They don't automatically report things if you're 30 days late. So if it goes to their internal collections department, you might be able to pay it off without it affecting your credit.

[StartinOver]

I have read through this whole thread. I was surprised people would say hurtful things. It sounds to me that the OP has done well and that the family is still together and the son might have just made a one-time bad mistake without knowing the cost of his actions. I am surprised Verizon allows this to happen without a call to her. I commend her in being able to keep it together as a single parent.

For my opinion, which is not worth much,  I think the advice I would try first is the advice to see if you can ask Verizon (maybe by first asking a supervisor, then by letter to the president) to separate it from your account and have it set up as a closed account in your son's name(with him signing an agreement to pay) . That way if he does not pay it, it ruins his credit, not yours. If he does, great.  This can be his first 'bill' so he can learn the lesson some of the others say they learned from their parents.  If that worked, it would totally take the worry off your shoulders.

Good luck in putting in an offer by April 31 and closing in time to get the $8000 first time buyer's credit. I, too, have worked hard, but probably won't make it.

[Anonymous]

StartinOver:

In all fairness, I think a lot of the negative comments stemmed from the fact that her posts gave the impression that her son wasn't willing to help her pay the bill. That was the impression that I got, and I think others got as well. Saying things like that it affected her relationship with him; that he doesn't have a job and can't get a job; that she had his phone turned off, and would take his truck away from him and sell it to pay the bill if she could -- all gave the impression that she was desperate and that her son wasn't willing to lift a finger to help. I think most of the people who responded with negative comments were reacting to that. Written communication isn't perfect; and her recent post showed that her son is helping her out as best he can; so it paints a different picture. But I think people originally got the impression of a 20 year old son not willing to help his mother out with a bill he created, and I think they just reacted out of concern and a desire to help.

Secondly, regarding why Verizon didn't call her to warn her? That's how they make their money!!! They HOPE you run up huge bills and have to pay them oodles and oodles of money. Just like the banks. Why don't the banks warn you or ask you before they put a charge through on your debit card that's going to create an overdraft. Because they want your money! Verizon has not need or desire to warn people when they run up large bills. In fact, they love it.

Someone else here mentioned how if there are large purchases on a person's credit card, the credit card company calls you, and Verizon should have done the same. But with the credit card companies, they're on the hook if there's fraud on your card. So they call you because they want to stop the transactions if they're illegitimate before they pay them. So it's to save them money, not you. But, unlike the credit card companies, Verizon has nothing to lose by letting you run up a huge bill, so there's no reason for them to call you.