Complaint Review: Verizon Northwest

After disconnecting Verizon Local telephone and DSL Service in June of 2004. I was sent to collections in November of 2005. This was to collect a debt from the DSL service which charged for 2 months after the phone line disconnet was ordered. The charge was for $84.05.

I located my records and found confirmation numbers of payment and telephone conversation records. They indicated I had contacted Verizon and told them that I was being charge and that my service was disconnected. They informed me that it would be taken care of. I never received another notice from them (from August 2004 - phone call, until November 2005 recieved - letter from Collectech SYS for collections).

I had a stroke when I was 29 and my fiancee informed them that I had a very dificult time speaking and that they would hav to talk to him. I gave them permission. They were most rude and would not listen to him or accept that he had the service disconneted over a year prior to the collection effort.

Both Verizon and Collectech indicated that they no longer had any of my records so my confirmation number could not be verified.

My fiancee filed a complaint with the FCC, the FTC, and an appeal according to the back of the collections letter. Collectech SYS, sent me a letter that said since I refused to talk to them they were sending me to a differnt collection agency and that I would be turned into all of the Credit Agencies.

At approximately the same date, I received a call from Verizon and thay informed me that the had located my documents and that I had actually overpaid them and they owed me 19+ dollars.

They indicated that they were able to stop the "new Collection Agency" from reporting me to the Credit Agencies.

My issue is that Verizon was going to attempt to ruin my credit when they owed me money. I had completed, informed, paid everything as I had stated to them. This was a close call and if I had not reported them to the FCC I would be in collections still, my credit hurt etc. or I would have paid them the $84.50. It is my opinion that they expect most people to just pay without going through the hassle! This brings in million of fraudulent money to the Verizon Corporation Annually.

Don't let this happen to you, if you have a problem get a hold of the FCC right away.

H.S.

Daniel
Spokane, Washington
U.S.A.