Verizon cut off my 90 year old mother's phones

[Calico]

I had an old 3G Tracfone.

For a solid year before they switched to 4G I received constant texts saying the switch was coming at the end of 2020; it's time to get a new phone; don't get left behind, etc. I also received emails with the same info.

They sent so many darn reminders that it drove me crazy, but there was no way to miss the messages, that's for sure.

I finally got a new 4G phone in December of 2020.

Lo and behold, what happened in January of 2021 (days after I set up my new phone)? I started getting text messages saying the "switch deadline has been delayed" and my old phone would keep working until the end of 2021.

For folks who don't use texts and don't use email and don't look at their bills I'm not sure you can place the blame on the provider. I would not expect the provider to call people individually to inform them of the impending switch.

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by harllee I don't think the Continuing Care Retirement Community has any duty regarding this. ....

I didn't mean to say they had a "duty" to inform residents. I just said it was a shame they didn't, just meaning it could have helped out. It's not a perfect world, so there you go.

-ERD50

[harllee]

But they could have sent an accurate letter--one that said the switch was on 9/3 rather than 12/31. The letter mother received was misleading and inaccurate.

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

I totally forgot Verizon is also playing fast and loose with what they promised the legislators to close the massive Tracfone deal. They're using the 3G shutdown as an excuse to migrate existing customers using ATT and T-Mobile sims with Tracfone over to Verizon service although they promised the legislators that existing customers could stay on their plans til November 2024 before being forced over to Verizon service. What they're not telling the customers is that they can buy a 99c Tracfone bring your own phone sim kit and using an unlocked 4g phone they can still stay with their preferred carrier and even move their existing balances over to the new phone. Instead they send the customer a Verizon sim and migrate them over to their brand so technically I suppose it's not illegal, they're just not offering all options. Also customers have also been complaining about their service suddenly being shut off due to their older 3G phones suddenly not working similar to OP's mothers situation. Reddit is awash with unhappy Tracfone customers but I think it's happening with all the other MVNO's that were part of that deal, Straight Talk also comes to mind.

[jldavid47]

Quote:

Originally Posted by harllee There is a 3G "router" that mother's home phone is hooked to and they cut off the 3 G router. Maybe it is actually Fios? In any event her home phone no longer works and Verizon says they had to cut it off because it was 3G.

OK, that's legit. There is hardware that allows you to tie a mobile device into a home phone. It isn't really a "land line" but an extension off the mobile device. That could definitely use 3G. If 3G went away then the "router" would be rendered useless.

[jldavid47]

Quote:

Originally Posted by harllee I disagree I could see this could be a class action lawsuit against Verizon if this happened to several elderly people after their 911 was cut off by Verizon. I think a jury or judge would be very sympathetic to an elderly person under these facts.

Verizon gave advance warning. You would have no case. You can bet their lawyers ran this scenario before doing this. Besides, once 3G service is cut there is no way to provide 911 service separately for those phones. You need to be able to connect to a cell tower to dial 911 and once they turn off 3G, connectivity for 3G phones for any purpose is impossible.

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by harllee But they could have sent an accurate letter--one that said the switch was on 9/3 rather than 12/31. The letter mother received was misleading and inaccurate.

But it is not clear that they didn't.

We'd really need to see the letter, and any that were sent along the way (that maybe you never saw).

As was posted earlier, that 12/31 date might have been the date they expected everything to be shut off, but they might have made it clear that some areas could be shut down earlier. IIRC, my notices were something like that.

-ERD50

[ivinsfan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ERD50 But it is not clear that they didn't. We'd really need to see the letter, and any that were sent along the way (that maybe you never saw). As was posted earlier, that 12/31 date might have been the date they expected everything to be shut off, but they might have made it clear that some areas could be shut down earlier. IIRC, my notices were something like that. -ERD50

My broke friend that I have talked about before had at least 3 years worth of unopened Verizon bills. They could have been telling him the sky was falling and he'd still be clueless. Not saying this happened with H's mom but something was off.

[cranberryjoe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by disneysteve That's awful. Verizon needed to take a lesson from AT&T. They handled the ending of 3G far better. We got notification ages ago, sometime last year I believe, that the service would be ending and my mom's phone would no longer work. We got several reminders. Finally, they sent out a new flip phone free of charge totally on their own. Her old phone remained active until we set up the new one so she was never without service and we didn't have to do a thing to make sure she had uninterrupted service.

AT&T did not handle it well here. AT&T's 3G cutoff in this area was in March. We only found out about it from seeing it mentioned on Internet news sites, and when my partner's cellphone voice calling suddenly stopped working around the end of March. No advance notifications of any kind from AT&T (text, email, paper, online bills, calls, carrier pigeon, ...).

[SecondAttempt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelB Cutting off communications service to anyone without proper notification is improper, but to do so to a senior citizen is inexcusable. Sometimes it’s important to complain, not for financial remedy or reimbursement, but for the principle and to help prevent the same from happening to others. I think complaining to the FCC is warranted, and would also complain to the state Attorney General and even write to the Verizon CEO. I would also consider sending a “letter to the editor” of her local news organization and the AARP.

A couple of things here...

First, 3G is old technology being phased out by all US carriers. This also takes out a lot of other services people have relied on such as original Kindles and many emergency and other car connectivity services. My BMW Connected Services stopped for example although I did not really use it. So Verizon may not be the villain here but may have just bungled the situation.

The said, I agree with MichaelB about complaining except to the Verizon CEO, although that may not hurt. I have complained directly to a CEO twice in my life and was successful both times in that I got their attention and my situation was addressed promptly and to my satisfaction. But both were situations where the lower level employees and managers egregiously created problems. And while I think the situation is egregious in that it interferred with your mother's ability to communicate in an emergency, I don't see how Verizon as a corporation was egregious. I might speak to the store manager at the store you visited though. If you do, recognize there is little he can do beyond disciplining the employees that did not help you and you will not get a promise or feedback about that since it is an HR matter.

Something you might consider is providing your or your sister's email on your mother's account so you get notices in the future.

[disneysteve]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SecondAttempt Something you might consider is providing your or your sister's email on your mother's account so you get notices in the future.

Definitely, since she doesn't do email herself. Fortunately, my mom is on our family plan so I get all the emails and snail mail and text notifications regarding her phone (and I pay the bill). I knew about the 3G thing in plenty of time, and as I said earlier, AT&T was on top of it and sent out a replacement phone automatically.

[daylatedollarshort]

It might be good to get her a spare, prepaid burner type phone or two, like the kind they'd keep in stock in Breaking Bad. Then if she loses her main phone or forgets to pay a bill, she has a back up emergency phone all set and ready to activate.

I had to get a new phone for the same reason a year or so ago from Consumer Cellular (T-mobile) and they sent notices out at least 6 months in advance.

[ncbill]

Quote:

Originally Posted by harllee There is a 3G "router" that mother's home phone is hooked to and they cut off the 3 G router. Maybe it is actually Fios? In any event her home phone no longer works and Verizon says they had to cut it off because it was 3G.

Sounds like a cellular adapter that ran over 3G...uses the cellular network but has a standard telephone port that provides dial tone where mom plugs in a wired phone.

I'm surprised they didn't offer a replacement that runs on the 4G network.

[rodi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jldavid47 3G is not a technology that "land lines" use. I worked in the industry for over 30 years including working with Verizon of cell phone programming. Land lines are generally old-fashioned wired service like we had when we were kids. Modern "land lines" are mostly Voice Over IP (VOIP) and are provided by many companies (mainly ISPs). If someone at Verizon actually said that her land line was 3G, they need to be fired.

Also worked in the industry, or at least industry related - I worked in the cable industry - but our corp did cell phones and cable modems, FIOS, etc... .. I suspect the person meant the modem that the 'land line' used for VOIP was an older 3g modem. None of the ISPs are good about upgrading the equipment when it's out of date.... they wait till a complaint comes in.

My son and a friend used to volunteer tech support at a retirement community that my step mom lived in. They boys were in middle school and early high school. A lot of their questions had to do with cell phones and some cable modem issues. (In addition to helping change printer ink, loading various drives for printers, etec.) The residents were about 1/2 tech savvy with really obscure tech questions that the boys would have to research - and the other half, the non tech savvy half, my son and his buddies talked into switching to jitterbug phones. Often an adult child of the resident would come in - understand the issue, and facilitate changing technology to something simpler. It was great experience for the boys. Even my step mom, who I put in the tech savvy bunch since she was still teaching online nursing statistics classes, started having more issues with technology as she got further into her late 80's.

I guess my point is technology gets harder as we get older. Terms change (server based is now 'cloud' for example), technology changes (3g cdma, vs 5g) And the folks at verizon and other companies don't hire the best/brightest for the call centers... that tends to be a minimum wage job.

[harllee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by daylatedollarshort It might be good to get her a spare, prepaid burner type phone or two, like the kind they'd keep in stock in Breaking Bad. Then if she loses her main phone or forgets to pay a bill, she has a back up emergency phone all set and ready to activate. I had to get a new phone for the same reason a year or so ago from Consumer Cellular (T-mobile) and they sent notices out at least 6 months in advance/

Are there any burner phones anymore? I bet most of them were 3G and no longer work. The cheapest Verizon 4G phone I have seen is $100 plus.

[harllee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rodi Also worked in the industry, or at least industry related - I worked in the cable industry - but our corp did cell phones and cable modems, FIOS, etc... .. I suspect the person meant the modem that the 'land line' used for VOIP was an older 3g modem. None of the ISPs are good about upgrading the equipment when it's out of date.... they wait till a complaint comes in. My son and a friend used to volunteer tech support at a retirement community that my step mom lived in. They boys were in middle school and early high school. A lot of their questions had to do with cell phones and some cable modem issues. (In addition to helping change printer ink, loading various drives for printers, etec.) The residents were about 1/2 tech savvy with really obscure tech questions that the boys would have to research - and the other half, the non tech savvy half, my son and his buddies talked into switching to jitterbug phones. Often an adult child of the resident would come in - understand the issue, and facilitate changing technology to something simpler. It was great experience for the boys. Even my step mom, who I put in the tech savvy bunch since she was still teaching online nursing statistics classes, started having more issues with technology as she got further into her late 80's. I guess my point is technology gets harder as we get older. Terms change (server based is now 'cloud' for example), technology changes (3g cdma, vs 5g) And the folks at verizon and other companies don't hire the best/brightest for the call centers... that tends to be a minimum wage job.

Thanks for this, at age 90 my mother has no technology sense. It is all she can do to answer her cellphone and turn the channels on her TV. At age 70 I am not much help either, it seems that technology is getting harder and harder for me too. I wish they had some young people at mom's retirement community to help them out. Mom has a great grandchild in high school but they seem too busy to help. The folks at Verizon were not helpful at all, in fact they were downright rude. If you are not buying a $1000 Apple phone they don't want to have anything to do with you.

[MissMolly]

Quote:

Originally Posted by harllee Are there any burner phones anymore? I bet most of them were 3G and no longer work. The cheapest Verizon 4G phone I have seen is $100 plus.

Yep. You can buy 4g burner phones for <$20.

https://www.amazon.com/TracFone-Flip...06&sr=8-3&th=1

[harllee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MissMolly Yep. You can buy 4g burner phones for <$20. https://www.amazon.com/TracFone-Flip...06&sr=8-3&th=1

Thanks, might make sense to have an extra one of these around.

[Midpack]

That’s unfortunate but Verizon did notify customers repeatedly - starting in 2016. I would have been a little proactive with that much notice. If she didn’t have email, maybe there was something on her statements, but I’d be very surprised if there weren’t several notices that someone didn’t notice. Filing complaints is a waste of your time and yours, but suit yourself. They even offered free phones to 3G customers

Quote:

Originally Posted by Verizon Since 2016, we have stated publicly that we are actively decommissioning our 3G CDMA network. Initially, we announced we would close down our 3G network in 2019. However, we extended our shut off date - first to the end of 2020 and now to the end of 2022 - in order to care for our customers and give them every effort to minimize disruptions to their service as they move to newer and more advanced technologies.

https://www.verizon.com/about/news/3...cember-31-2022

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/08/veri...-network-.html

[RobbieB]

Yeah, AT&T sent me a free phone when they switched. Not a flip of course.