Verizon Wireless Mail-in rebate nightmare Ashland Ohio

In November of 2008, we were enticed to upgrade my Verizon Wireless phone to a new Envy 2. At the Verizon Wireless store, we were lured by a $50 mail-in rebate. The clerk gave us the documents, including the rebate form itself, and we mailed it in two days later.

Over time we kept trying to use Verizon's rebate website to track our rebate but nothing ever showed up. I finally started calling them and found they said they had not received our documents. VERY fortunately, I had photocopied everything. UNFORTUNATELY, they aren't big on accepting photocopies of the UPC code from the box. In our favor was that we had all of the proof that we did indeed purchase the phone, including not only our sales receipt from the Verizon Wireless store but also our VISA sales receipt. Furthermore, the MEID for the phone also appeared on the sales receipt from the store.

After spending an enormous amount of time on the phone with the Verizon Rebates center, they did issue a tracking number and had us fax in all of our documentation, and we thought everything was handled. But two weeks later we received a postcard saying the UPC code was invalid. Back on the phone with the Rebate center I was told that the Envy 2 we had purchased was NOT eligible for the rebate. The rebate form we had sent in came from the Verizon Wireless store, as I explained to the Rebates agent, AND my Envy 2 had been shown online, on Verizon's website, also touting the $50 mail-in rebate, but predictably there was nothing she could do. We could not believe it!

Feeling we had been "had" I ended up back on the phone with Verizon Wireless Customer Care and they conferenced on my wife and after explaining the situation one last time, the Care agent gave us a $50 credit on our wireless bill and we thanked him profusely. We have been Verizon Wireless customers for about 7 years now and really didn't want to take our business elsewhere, but we were fully prepared to do so out of a feeling that we had been "had" in this whole mess.

This whole nightmare is over but we've been left with a few lessons. First, we will never trust mail-in rebates from Verizon Wireless again. Second, although I understand that Verizon uses a contract-center to handle their mail-in rebates, we as customers hold THEM, Verizon Wireless, responsible when things like this happen because it is to THEM that we send our money, not the rebate-processing people. And third, because it turns out the root of our problem turned out that the Verizon Wireless store we purchased my phone from provided us with invalid rebate documents, we will NEVER conduct business with them ever again.

I do have to say a big thanks to Verizon Wireless Customer Care for finally understanding how crazy this whole nightmare was and doing the right thing. To anyone thinking about dealing with a mail-in rebate for a Verizon Wireless offer, I would seriously think twice about it. Really.

John
Ashland, Ohio
U.S.A.