Verizon can't do arithmetic.

[Airencracken]

http://www.digg.com/tech_news/Verizon_doesn_t_know_Dollars_from_Cents

http://verizonmath.blogspot.com/

http://media.putfile.com/Verizon-Bad-Math


The call is 29 min long and it's worth listening to every second. This greatly saddens me. How can Verizon reps not understand that $0.002 != $0.00002? These are grown adults who can't understand basic arithmetic.

What does that say about the state of education? Ugh.

[BigJon]

ROFL, took me a minute to understand it too...then I realized I wasn't focusing on the dollars and cents thing.

[cadetevon]

This is brilliant.

How could this person be a supervisor? LOL

This gets better and better as the call goes on. "That's 100% different."

[Paymaster]

Man, I'm losing it just listening. How did this guy maintain his cool?!?!

[bachviet]

Man that was funny. :laugh:

Either they are stoopid or they are just playing dumb.

[Napoleon54]

Now wait a minute (or an hour, 'cause maybe those are the same too)... are we dealing with Canadian numbers?

[jaja]

:laugh: :bigmouth: :laugh: :bigmouth: :laugh: :bigmouth:

[Cheesypuff]

The call is 29 min long and it's worth listening to every second. This greatly saddens me. How can Verizon reps not understand that $0.002!=$0.00002? These are grown adults who can't understand basic arithmetic.

What does that say about the state of education? Ugh.



I don't get your equation here...maybe I don't get the symbols

$0.002!=$0.00002

does the "!" mean "not"?

[Airencracken]

I don't get your equation here...maybe I don't get the symbols

$0.002!=$0.00002

does the "!" mean "not"?

It's an expression from C (the computer language) and it means not equal. The != that is.

[ArkiStan]

Hilarious! It's so good I actually listened to the whole 27-minute clip. What's really funny is that every single person he talks to at Verizon has no clue what he's talking about. Not a SINGLE person gets it!! haha.

[ray]

i can't make it past the first 2 minutes without falling over my chair in laughter.

[bachviet]

Verizon conceded and credited back the amount - $.72 (72 cents). :D

[Napoleon54]

Verizon conceded and credited back the amount - $.72 (72 cents). :D

^ Behold the power of the mighty internets!

[Markel]

does the "!" mean "not"?
No, "!" means "bang". And of course, "!!" means "double-bang".

[attgig]

man... poor guy.

[yippiekiyeh]

:heh: hehe here's something for this thread, apparently it's a internet Meme link here (http://www.hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTE2NjIxNzgwMkl1clNySTZ5b2JfMV8xX2wuanBn)

[VTGreg]

It's really sad.

[Thesifer]

Awesome. Although this clip (at least on the Last link seems to be 1 hour 47 minutes long)

[VTGreg]

Yeah. I'm about 27 minutes in. This guy must be one of the most patient people alive. I probably would have reached out and touched someone much earlier in the conversation.

Edit: It says it is over 1.5 hours long but it is only 27 min and 33 seconds.

[Thesifer]

Yeah I just noticed that when I listened to it. Has anyone found an update from this guy? Or his blog? Nevermind, looks like it is the second link?

[TofuNinja]

The floor manager is not customer service trained at all. She was talking to him like he was the idiot when she was the idiot LOL

[TofuNinja]

Edit: It says it is over 1.5 hours long but it is only 27 min and 33 seconds.

Must be that Fuzzy Verizon Math :rolleyes:

[Thesifer]

The floor manager is not customer service trained at all. She was talking to him like he was the idiot when she was the idiot LOL


Yeah, but she thought HE was the idiot! :wavey2:

[Markel]

The guy was extraordinarily patient. But I think he should have hammered home to them what $.002 means - they constantly read it as .002 cents, not .002 dollars.

[johnnymk]

So are these people from Verizon right-brain or left-brain oriented or possibly no-brain oriented?

[Thesifer]

The guy was extraordinarily patient. But I think he should have hammered home to them what $.002 means - they constantly read it as .002 cents, not .002 dollars.


Well at one point they both agreed or seemed to that ".002 Dollars" doesn't exists. I'll have to listen again to see if I heard it right. I know for sure she said "That doesn't even exist" or close to that.

[speedracer120]

Wow. My brother told me about this a couple of weeks ago and since I don't want to study for my next final, I'm listening to this and all I can think is "WOW!" Dollars and cents people! Two different measurements! Wow. Absolutely incredible.

[ArkiStan]

The guy was extraordinarily patient. But I think he should have hammered home to them what $.002 means - they constantly read it as .002 cents, not .002 dollars.

Totally. There were moments when I was getting frustrated at the guy for not explaining it clearer. Maybe it's just me, but reading "0.002" out as "2 one-thousanths" just makes it more confusing.

[InfiniteNothing]

Yeah that definitely seemed to lose them. I get what he was trying to convey with that though: that it was much much less than a cent per minute. I would have tried to drive home $0.00002/kb. When they punch in 0.00002 into their calculator, they would have come up with the familiar $0.72

Verizon conceded and credited back the amount - $.72 (72 cents)
Link?

[Houdini]

The best he did was the $20k car example. I'd love to buy a car from the guy. 20,000 = $200. That would be great!

He was trying to not be condescending to each person. He was talking kinda fast for the obviously undeducated people maybe.

"I've never heard of .002 dollars! It doesn't exist." - the third person.

I would have said, "Please write this down:

.2 dollars = 20 cents, right? ("yes")
.02 dollars = 2 cents. ("yes")
.002 dollars = .2 cents. ("yes")
.0002 dollars = .02 cents. ("yes")
.00002 dollars is equal to .002 cents. ("yes")

You're multiplying by cents? ("yes") So you're charging me dollars? ("yes") Then why not charge me cents instead? I'd be more than happy to pay the quoted price in cents."

If I'm still being jerked around, I'd consider threatening legal action. I'm generally against firvolous lawsuits, but this is not one. Not that I'd sue them for a $million or something, but I'd definitely push for at least a year free usage or a nicer phone or something along with a plan change. A class action suit may be in order, but then everyone would still lose their $70something, and be awarded $5 or so while the lawyer would walk away happy with zillions.

Personally, I've been battling Sprint for a while. My A900 Samsung that I've had for a few months has recently gotten to the point that, even if plugged into my car, my talk time is much less than one hour.

Also, my "On Demand" service stopped working. It would just lock up my phone. Same with my scheduling program, which still works, but it takes >1 minute to open and about as long to save.

When I called about this obvious hardware problem, I was told that it was a problem with my plan. Keep in mind that it had been working for several weeks w/o problems. When I called to complain, I was transferred to a real bitch who was more condescending than, well, a former socialist member of this forum. "What you had was like dial-up. What we're offering is now like DSL, and DSL is faster than dial-up, sir." etc.

I again implored that it was a hardware problem. Even if they upgraded their software, my scheduler should work. My web stuff worked fine, as long as I didn't use the more useful "on demand" program. I spoke to just about everyone at Sprint. Finally I was told to wait for the firmware upgrade or bring it to a Sprint store for re-flashing.

Did both. Sprint store refused to re-flash. Firmware is updated, but still, if I go into the "on-demand" service, my phone crashes. Have to remove the battery and put it back in. And get this, while I have the "fair and flexible 39.99 plan, and agreed to the $15 unlimited web access plan, I'm being charged $80+/month. When I call Sprint, they assure me that I'm only paying 39.99, while we're both looking at the same effing web page!

I feel like I should go the BBB route or consult legal services, as I'm getting screwed out of $25-$30/month for some extra mystery service, and I'm paying $15 for a service that is very crippled by the hardware.

Any suggestions? I'm kinda eyeing the Treo 700, but can't decide b/w the Palm or the Windows version. Neither has wireless capability, but that might not matter if the Sprint wireless works fast. I have a nice wireless, etc., Palm Lifedrive, but I don't like carrying around both a phone and a thick, heavy palm.

So, the disadvantage for the Windows version is that it has a smaller non-high res screen and inability to watch TV (as even my samsung flip phone can/could do). Whereas Palm OS is often inherently unstable and less than compatible with Word, etc.

So, any advice regarding any of this? I'm at my freakin' wits' end.

Thanks,

H