Verizon Wireless Apparently Still Can't Train Its Sales People In Basic Math
from the add-your-0.2-cents dept
You may recall the story from last year about Verizon Wireless' dubious math skills. What kicked off the story was a guy traveling to Canada with a Verizon Wireless EVDO account. He had asked how much the roaming charges would be, and was told 0.002 cents per kilobyte -- which is quite reasonable. However, when he got his next bill, it was quite a lot bigger than he expected. That's because Verizon Wireless actually charges 0.002 dollars per kilobyte. When confronted on this, hilarity (or frustration, depending on your point of view) ensued. Even when being explained the difference in dollars and cents clearly, Verizon Wireless customer service reps continued to insist that 0.002 cents per kilobyte is the same thing as 0.002 dollars per kilobyte. The publicity backlash convinced Verizon Wireless to refund the guy's money (though still demand he not use their logo on his blog about the story). Either way, you would think that this widely talked about event would have Verizon Wireless careful to train their customer service reps on the difference between dollars and cents. Not so, apparently.Broadband Reports points us to a guy who clearly has way too much free time, who decided to check up on Verizon Wireless, calling the company 56 times to ask about two separate data rates. Out of 56 customer service reps he spoke to, a grand total of one gave him the correct info on both questions. 52% answered both questions incorrectly. All in all, he received 22 unique answers, with many underquoting the actual rate by a factor of 100. However, as he noted, that didn't stop nearly all of them from immediately then offering him a two-year contract -- which you could claim was sold to him with false data about what he'd be paying. He put together a nice video to highlight some of the incorrect statements from Verizon Wireless CSRs:
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Filed Under: data charges, dollars and cents, math
Companies: verizon wireless
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oh... come on!
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misinformed?
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What morons
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Re: What morons
It would really be 2.048 per megabyte.
($0.002 x 1024)
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What's wrong with those people?
And not knowing the answer? To these two questions? What's wrong with those people?
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Verizon --
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Re: Verizon --
... If we believe a guy who can't figure out we're talking about evdo.
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Re: Verizon --
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Get rid of the humans
Remember, "call center rep." is not a class in college that is offered, at least not in the U.S., maybe in India though.
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1 out of 56! right
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Re: CSR's
I understand that there are likely to be hundreds of tiny facts, but that's why they sit in front of a computer and are supposedly trained to use it.
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Sales.
You can't drop this. If you were told that Gasoline was 3.19 CENTs per gallon, you pump 30 gallons because its such a good deal and get hit with a $95 tab you would be pissed too.
The only difference here is that it would have been a months worth of gas and your ass is stuck pumping at this gas station for 2 years!
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Sigh...
So Verizon could lower their price to $2 per MB or round up to $2.05 per MB or choose any other price per MB. The point was they could have avoided all this bad publicity if they'd stated the price per KB rather than MB.
Go back to slashdot you tards.
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Sigh...
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KB's vs. MB's
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video gone?
anyone have a link where it hasn't been taken down?
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OMG
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You pay peanuts, you get monkeys
It gets worse... some employees at Fast-food restaurants cannot make change without a computer-controlled till yelling at them to give the customer 21c.
Frankly, the innumeracy of many young (and some not-so-young) people scares me.
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Verizon
That has to hurt and should be causing a few folks at the VZ HQ to step up and make this right. Too bad VZ didn't think of doing this to themselves and address it quietly.
Nobody is Perfect but they really ought to try!!!
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great video
The thing is that I could never get a clear answer, much like in this call, how much that would cost. And much worse, they make it impossible to find this rate online. I looked and looked and looked - I could never find it.
If you have a pay as you go data plan, they show you the data you have used, but they don't convert it into dollars until you get the bill so its really hard to know what you have spent so that you can manage your use.
In fact had this same exact thing happened, that I could never get a clear answer on the rate until it was too late. Some quoted a rate that made not having a data plan make sense, actually its a horrible deal.
#7 > good luck finding it online.
#24 > Verizon does offer a flat rate plan, but it is very expensive - $40 / month just for data. You pay this even if your phone does not do EVDO.
This is part of the reason why I switched to iPhone. The data plan was only $20/month. For all the people saying the iPhone is expensive, anyone with a Treo, Motorola Q, Blackberry or other smartphone on Verizon is paying twice as much per month for unlimited data as I am paying for data with the iPhone on ATT.
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Plausible Deniability
Part of the problem is that tele-service reps are deliberately *UNDER-INFORMED* so as not to, "confuse them and the customer".
In fact, though, it also provides a path for the Management folks to have a path of "plausible deniability" since they verbally instruct the reps to say one thing, then deny they ever said anything such thing when put to the "question" under oath.
Huge example was about five years ago when SBC (Now the "New AT&T") was caught slamming customers with orders for DSL service and equipment charges never ordered. SBC tried to blame the tele-marketing firm supporting the project, yet were found responsible as they just happened to accept a "mere 10,000" of these tainted orders.
Lesson, if the reps don't have the correct and thorough info, you can pretty well count on the principle company making sure it was set up that way.
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Schools get the new verizion math
http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/prnewswire/NYTH10915112007-1.htm
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shady business
The real lesson in all this? Don't trust the phone company as far as you can safely toss their products.
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In our shoes
--we are underpaid.
--we deal with a staggering amount of information.
--we get to talk to people who do not respect us or our jobs.
--we get you at your worst and are forced to smile and take whatever crap you choose to sling.
--because our interaction with you is not face to face you feel that you can behave in a way that in person would eventually end in assault.
--the turnover rate in my job is astronomical because the relentless day to day stupidity of the people we talk to drives people over the edge. Look at it this way-think of the least competent person you know when it comes to technology or math (maybe an elderly relative or mentally ill neighbor) and then imagine explaining how to set up voicemail to this person over the phone. Over and over again 5 days a week, 8 hours a day.
Here are some examples of requests I've gotten:
-I want you to change the font size on my bill (I can't even get the schedule I want and you think I can change the way your bill looks?)
-You tell my daughter that she can't text message anymore
-I want you to go over my bills for the last 4 months and tell me when you find a number with a 2 in it because I lost my phone and I really need my friends number.
I get to take these calls knowing full well that a 1.50 pay cut would land me a job dropping potatoes in a box of boiling fat.
Overall I understand the frustration I'm reading here. Your money is affected by our mistakes. Understand this though, 85 calls per day and I might make one mistake a week giving out information that is complex and constantly evolving. We do our best and all we ask is some degree of respect.
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