Phone Companies

Verizon Wireless and, at least as I'm told by one of their CSRs, T-Mobile and all the other big boys have instituted a policy. If one changes anything in her contract*, as one must if one gets a PDA (there's a mandatory minimum $30 data plan for all PDAs, at least at Verizon, and I'm sure T-Mobe has something very similar), one goes from paying after each month to paying before each month, which means that the month of the change brings a double bill. Now one can supposedly get this money back by ending the contract. Of course the only way to do this without an exorbitant early termination fee is to wait out that two year contract that paid for one's new phone after one's old phone happened to stop working properly 1.5 years into one's old contract. Supposing, of course, that one doesn't lose or break one's phone at some point in the next two years (and the insurance one pays every month, by the way, doesn't cover one for the things that actually happen to one's phone 92% of the time). And then, of course, even if one does make it through those two years and gets one's money rebated to her, you'll have to use it, and probably more, as the start up cost for your new contract with anyone else. And yeah, one could go to Cricket, if one doesn't care about not having service 25%-75% of the time, depending on where one lives.

Why does Verizon do this to their customers despite the fact that Nextel/Sprint , Tmobile, AT&T and Verizon are all being sued for forming a virtual trust with one another and are being reviewed by government panels for other corrupt practices as well? Well, my guess is that several upper middle aged white men in nice suits got together, had some scotch and some cigars and then decided to laugh at and spit on the faces of their customers by basically making them pay the legal fees with what amounts to raping their customers into lending them $30-$80 dollars a head, a loan for which the vast majority will never be paid back.

*Why do they wait until you change your contract? Otherwise, we'd all notice, and what they're doing would be quite clear and quite clearly unacceptable. In other words, they wouldn't be able to make an "explanation of monthly access charges" section that looks like this:

Monthly Access Charges These are your fixed monthly charges that are based on your Plan and Optional Services. If you change your plans or services during the month, an adjusted charge that includes partial month charges or credits, may appear on your bill.

$106.52

America's Choice 450 Refund 08/08 - 08/25	-23.22
Nationwide Basic 450 08/08 - 08/25	23.22
Nationwide Basic 450 08/26 - 09/25	39.99
Current Data Plan 08/08 - 08/25	17.41
Current Data Plan 08/26 - 09/25	29.99
WPP Insurance - Asurion 08/26 - 09/25	4.99
Extended Warranty 08/08 - 08/25	1.16
Extended Warranty 08/26 - 09/25	1.99
Ringback Tones 08/26 - 09/25	.99
500 MSG Allowance + Unl IN MSG - Refund 07/26 - 08	-10.00
500 MSG Allowance + Unl IN MSG 07/26 - 08/25	10.00
500 MSG Allowance + Unl IN MSG 08/26 - 09/25	10.00