pissed offLong story short, the dude at the Verizon store said "Moving overseas is a legitimate reason to cancel your contract penalty-free. Call this number."
So I did, and they said it was taken care of, but that I'd have to pay for a couple of months (to finish paying for the calls I'd already made). So I paid my bills through July of 2003 (I moved to England in June of 2003, so I did pay for a month of service I never even used -- the US and UK use incompatible networks).
In late June, I sent them, in writing, another request to cancel my contract (which should have already been done), my new address, my new phone number, my new last name, and my new email address (I signed up with a university email address which got scrubbed when I graduated). I sent it via international recorded delivery, and I got confirmation that it got there.
They have not ONCE tried to contact me. And as far as I know, they never called my parents' house either.
In the past three days, my dad has had two calls from a collection agency over a "debt" of $221.
Now. Since it's been referred to a collection agency, do I have any chance of dealing with Verizon over this? I've not really had any problem before.
When I left the US, I paid off all my credit cards, my auto insurance, bank fees, even campus parking tickets and a library fine. I'm continuing to pay off my student loan. My husband and I have a mortgage and utilities and a car and we've never missed a payment. I've never had monetary problems before. Should I just shut up and pay it so it won't screw up my credit in the US? I don't really have the money right now -- I changed contracts at work and they shorted my paycheck this month. Would the debt collector be willing to wait until May?
I'm going to try calling them in a few hours (around 4 or 5 here so it'll be 10 or 11 there). What should I do?
Thanks for your help!
(Corss-posted to
customers_suck