After a customer backlash, Verizon Wireless on Friday dropped a plan to start charging $2 for every payment subscribers make over the phone or online with their credit or debit cards.
After a consumer backlash, Verizon Wireless has dropped its plans to charge an extra $2 for every payment subscribers make over the phone or online with their credit cards.
The fee was targeted to one-time payments. It wasn’t targeted to electronic check payments or to automatic credit card payments set up with Verizon’s AutoPay system — where Verizon Wireless would store the customers’ credit card numbers.
12/30/2011
Verizon Wireless has decided it will not institute the fee for online or telephone single payments that was announced earlier this week.
The company made the decision in response to customer feedback about the plan, which was designed to improve the efficiency of those transactions. The company continues to encourage customers to take advantage of the numerous simple and convenient payment methods it provides.
“At Verizon, we take great care to listen to our customers. Based on their input, we believe the best path forward is to encourage customers to take advantage of the best and most efficient options, eliminating the need to institute the fee at this time,” said Dan Mead, president and chief executive officer of Verizon Wireless.
— Verizon Wireless
Verizon Wireless has over 91 million phone customers.
One customer, Molly Katchpole, of Washington D.C., wasn’t going to take it anymore. She set up a petition on change.org to “Tell Verizon: Drop the fee for paying bills online”
As of of 5:41 p.m. CST Friday, December 30, 2011, there were 118,184