Transferred Bill went on Credit report immediately

[diniowa]

I am making an attempt to resolve my issue before taking further action.  I transferred my account from my husbands for a couple weeks and cancelled it. I owed $155. I kept getting a summary for over $250. I wanted to get the discrepancy straightened out before paying. I finally got someone on the line at Verizon Wireless that understood what error had taken place about 2 months later.  I had spoken to 3 or 4 agents to get the issue straightened out. The issue was never resolved even though I was told it was over and over again. Once I got the corrected bill ( 2 months later)  I still had never seen a detailed bill and was told this is what I would get. I called again- 5th or 6th time by now and was promised I would get a detailed bill. About 4 months into the ordeal I finally got the detailed bill. I am very busy, it took me a couple weeks to review the bill. I called to pay the bill and they could not find my account, every time they entered it, it came up under my husband. I tried to go through the special over due bill link and the payment went to my husbands current account. I was not aware this had happened until I got a letter from a collection agency, I called Verizon the day I received it and they said the previous payment was posted to my husbands account. Okay fine! I called the collection agency and paid them. Finally my payment went to the right bill and everything was squared away! Until a couple weeks later, I got an email saying my credit score was going down 50 points. WHOA!!! I went on credit karma to see what was going on, it was Verizon wireless.  I spent hours talking to the billing department trying to get them to understand that I paid this before it went to collections, it took months to get my balance and detailed bill. Also the day it went to collections, it was sent to the bureaus. This is where I seriously feel a violation is being made by Verizon Wireless. I cannot find any law or regulation allowing this.  How is this permitted? I paid the agency the day I got the first bill! It was reported to transunion etc. 10 days later!

[vzw_customer_support]

This is NOT the wireless experience that we want you to have with us diniowa! Allow us to partner with you and get this resolved. May I ask do you have documentation of the payment you made to the correct account? This is going to be critical as we may need to verify this before proceeding. If you do have this documentation then I would suggest contacting our recovery team at 800-852-1922 to get this resolved once and for all.

Thank you…

ArnettH_VZW
Follow us on Twitter @VZWSupport

[diniowa]

Hola ArnettH,

The bill is now accurately showing as paid since I paid the collection agency. When I paid on my account originally I paid what I thought the amount was at the time which didn't specifically match the exact amount owed. Therefore, they didn't allow that documentation as proof of payment prior to collections. Even though it is for the same phones that were on both accounts and I made the payment from my personal account. I sent all of the documentation I had. I am very upset about the practice of sending an account to the credit bureaus the day it leaves your office. I was told this is the procedure. I paid the exact amount owed to the collection agency since they were able to locate my account immediately as opposed to the numerous phone calls I made and could not get my account pulled up by your reps because the phone was still active. I now know they needed to look by my name, a couple of them must have been newer, when I said you have to look me up by my name or my husbands account will come up, they refused to do so!

I never had an issue paying my bill, it is my bill, I owed it. I wanted to know what I was paying for and make sure it was correct. For 2 months they had one of our lines active that we had shut off. I was told I would be credited for that and it took them another 2 months to credit me correctly for their error. Mainly because they couldn't find the account or accurately make the updates when I did find someone that would look me up correctly. I spent hours on the phone trying to explain my side and why I felt this should not have gone to collections.  I don't feel that calling again would get anywhere. Is this truly the practice- to send someone to the bureau the day you send an account to the collection agency? I was a supervisor at a collection agency and I have never heard of such a selfish, mean, cruel, anti-customer service thing to do. Most companies allow 30 days for payment prior to turning into the bureau. I thought it was the law!

We currently have 6 active lines with Verizon with 15 megs of data. We have had Verizon for many years- we have always been very good customers. We only have Verizon now because that is the service we can get in our home. Well guess what, we are getting ready to move and are very ready to give our 6 lines of service and $400 a month to another company!

• December 20- switched 4 lines to my own name from spouse.
• December 24th- He asked if I would continue to pay the entire bill while we were separated. I had the bills joined back together. I was told I would have fees and charges and would receive a final bill.
  • I cancelled one of the lines that was no longer on contract.
  • I asked if it would be itemized because I would no longer be able to look online. I was told yes final bills are itemized.
  • Around January 15th I got a summarized bill for an amount that seemed to be very high. I called and was again promised an itemized bill.
  • February 10th- I got another summary with an additional amount which was higher than the previous bill. I called and was told that I still had an active line, this was the line I cancelled. 
• March - April 15 - Various phone calls ranging in results from they couldn't find me or refused to find me to promising to send an accurate bill with the correct amount.
• End of April- Finally received an itemized bill that appeared to be accurate with incorrectly billed amounts refunded.
• Mid May- Paid the bill to the special link to recovery I had saved on my computer. I did not have the exact amount with me so I paid what I believed to be accurate.
• June 7- Received collection bill
  • Looked at my husbands account and noticed the amount I paid was applied to his account.
  • Called the collection agency and paid them, the same day I got the first notice.
• June 9th- The bill that was paid to collections a few short days after they received it showed up on my credit bureau as unpaid and remained showing unpaid for 2 months.
• July- Spoke to Verizon multiple times for hours pleading and begging for understanding so that my credit would not be ruined. Pointing out, I am still a current customer and all of the lines are still active and Verizon took months to get my account straight to NO RESOLUTION!! For an additional 2 months or more my account still showed unpaid.  Once it finally showed paid, my credit score went up about 3 points with a total new damage of about 47 points for this debacle with Verizon!

I understand there are rules and you have to be fair. There are also extenuating circumstances and situations that do not fit into a perfect box. I feel I had one of those.  I expected a human to review my human situation and encountered no real person that was allowed to have a mind of their own and make a decision that made sense!