Annoyed. My First Vent of the New Year

[Pea-n-Me]

A few experiences we’ve had:

We left our toiletry bag in our bathroom at the Contemporarty once.
And another time, I left some clothes in drawers on the Disney Cruise Line.
Both times, somewhat shockingly and without any contact from me (I hadn’t even realized they were missing), I received my items in the mail within a week or so from Disney, on their dime.

DS’s girlfriend lost her wallet on Magical Express last fall.
After some very tense hours without it (and everything in it, including license and gift cards), the next day a ME representative brought it to their resort and gave it to her in person. General Manager of resort was helpful.

Last Christmas season we received a large Air Fryer on our doorstep from Amazon that we had not ordered.
I called Amazon to straighten it out, and they thanked us and told us to keep it. (It’s still in the box.)

It’s so nice when you get good customer service. OP I hope it works out ok.

 

[emer95]

Everyone keeps focusing on the 14 mile drive, but as the OP said, it’s not just that. I have never been to a Verizon store without having a lengthy wait just to get an employee to talk to me. So add 30 minutes or more to that drive. Plus weather is crappy this time of year, and if she has to go after work or on the weekend, traffic is busy. It’s an inconvenience that the OP absolutely should not have to have. I’m firmly on your side with this, OP.

 

[sk!mom]

You do realize once I get there, I have to stand and wait my turn? Believe me, it's not a 10 minute wait.

A 14 mile drive out of my way is not something I am willing to do after working all day, let alone stand in line to be helped with the return of a product I didn't order.

I understand your frustration. By the end of my work day, I’m annoyed by any errand. I just want to get home.

Having said that, at this point, I’d be more worried about getting charged for an extra phone or this Somehow messing up service to the phone that I did order since CS seemed to have difficulty figuring this out.

Is there a store in a safer area? If not then I’d be there when they open Saturday morning (or Sunday) to hopefully avoid a line and cut down on weekday traffic. If the area truly made me nervous, I’d get DH to go with me. Then I’d treat us to a nice brunch somewhere for taking care of an unpleasant errand. Get some kind of receipt for returning it just in case.

 

[DisneyHardin]

I'm a little confused about the no box part of the situation. OP - are you meaning that you threw away the outer, shipping box? Or you took the phone/charger/paperwork/etc out of the factory box and don't have that one? If it's just a shipping box, surely there is something around your house you can ship it back in - even a padded envelope would be fine if you still have the factory box. This, of course, is assuming they did actually send you a prepaid mailing label.

 

[kymom99]

It’s also important to note that you shouldn’t take the phone to one of those authorized retailers. At least I wouldn’t. So for me I would have quite a drive over interstate roads to the nearest corporate store.

 

[sam_gordon]

It’s also important to note that you shouldn’t take the phone to one of those authorized retailers. At least I wouldn’t. So for me I would have quite a drive over interstate roads to the nearest corporate store.

Are you referring to "Verizon" branded stores? If Verizon is the sign for the building (not that they just sell Verizon), that's fair game IMO.

 

[kymom99]

Are you referring to "Verizon" branded stores? If Verizon is the sign for the building (not that they just sell Verizon), that's fair game IMO.

It should be but I would never.

 

[Pink Partridge]

She could have easily tossed the phone in her junk drawer and called it a day.

I think that's what I should have done

It should be but I would never.

I would NEVER at this store. It would be "lost" and pocketed. These people are not to be trusted and it's a revolving door. One of the many reasons I ordered online.

 

[sk!mom]

I'm a little confused about the no box part of the situation. OP - are you meaning that you threw away the outer, shipping box? Or you took the phone/charger/paperwork/etc out of the factory box and don't have that one? If it's just a shipping box, surely there is something around your house you can ship it back in - even a padded envelope would be fine if you still have the factory box. This, of course, is assuming they did actually send you a prepaid mailing label.

confused by this too. I think that if I got my delivery and then another showed up, I wouldn’t have unboxed it.

 

[sk!mom]

I would NEVER at this store. It would be "lost" and pocketed. These people are not to be trusted and it's a revolving door. One of the many reasons I ordered online.

In that case, we’re back to, have them send you a return shipping label.

I had this issue with Old Navy at Christmas. They sent me the wrong item. They emailed me a shipping label and told me to just tape the torn mailing envelope back together. I did and it went through.

I have had a similar issue to the Op in the past- two Roombas. It was complicated to return it. It took CS a couple of people to figure how to send a shipping label for an unordered item.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

It took CS a couple of people to figure how to send a shipping label for an unordered item.

That's where I was coming from. People think "snap your fingers it's easy just send me whatever" but rarely are things that easy and in the case of this where this item was a duplicate it's something that could be a lot harder for them to "talk" to their system to generate exactly what the OP wants (a box and a label). People don't really care about the ins and outs of a company's system and I'm not saying people should but perhaps approaching it with understanding that it may really not be as easy peasy as you think it is.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

confused by this too. I think that if I got my delivery and then another showed up, I wouldn’t have unboxed it.

I could see where if both boxes (and this is assuming they were in two different boxes) were labeled to the OP's family they wouldn't necessarily know which one was the one tied to their account and was the real phone they were supposed to activate. Sounds like they could have looked up their account to match up the numbers and I think I would have thought of that but probably not before just opening both boxes first and inspecting the phones.

I have no idea why someone would toss a box away when the item is duplicate. That makes no sense because you know you only ordered 1, you know you're only supposed to have 1. So I'm not sure what is accomplished by tossing a box of a known duplicate item other than not really thinking through that.

For returns I frequently use old prime boxes, old bubble wrap envelopes (which are usually prime lol), and in some cases the company advised to just reuse their own packaging they sent such was the case with SHEFIT when I needed to exchange for a different size and theirs was just plastic packaging. It's just making sure old tracking and address information is either completely covered up or removed.

 

[robinb]

We left our toiletry bag in our bathroom at the Contemporarty once.

I left my travel jewelry case at OKW when we switched over to BWV. I realized my mistake and called within hours of checking out that I had accidentally left it there. I called a few more times over the next week and it was not found while we were still in Florida. It was eventually returned to me at my home a few weeks later ... minus my diamond ear studs .

 

[kirstenb1]

OP you were driving your dd back to school. Bet they have a Verizon store in a college town. Turn it in there.

 

[mrodgers]

14 miles

Hardly asking someone to run a marathon.

It use to take me 20 minutes to drive 20 minutes home. In town, it takes 20 minutes to drive 6 miles driving in slow motion and stopping constantly at traffic lights, so yeah, 14 miles could very well be 40 minutes out and 40 minutes home plus the time to deal with them and their mistake face to face.

Oops, round trip, so 40 minutes driving round trip for someone else's mistake that they don't want to be bothered with fixing because they think they can just charge you for their mistake.

 

[mrodgers]

That's where I was coming from. People think "snap your fingers it's easy just send me whatever" but rarely are things that easy and in the case of this where this item was a duplicate it's something that could be a lot harder for them to "talk" to their system to generate exactly what the OP wants (a box and a label). People don't really care about the ins and outs of a company's system and I'm not saying people should but perhaps approaching it with understanding that it may really not be as easy peasy as you think it is.

Easy peasy is you made a mistake, you need to fix it, not me. The easiest thing for the company to do to solve the issue is "go ahead and keep it." Instead, they want her to return what she didn't ask to receive on her dime and/or time to fix their mistake. Nope, your mistake to fix, not mine.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Easy peasy is you made a mistake, you need to fix it, not me. The easiest thing for the company to do to solve the issue is "go ahead and keep it." Instead, they want her to return what she didn't ask to receive on her dime and/or time to fix their mistake. Nope, your mistake to fix, not mine.

Well with an attitude like that I'm sure you're well..err..you know what I'm going to say

 

[mrodgers]

Well with an attitude like that I'm sure you're well..err..you know what I'm going to say

I brought home about $30,000 last year to pay my bills, pay for my kid's college, and save some money. Verizon had $78 billion in profit. They want their $40 cost phone back, they can figure out how. Attitudes that allow companies to walk all over their customers are the reason companies walk all over their customers.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

I brought home about $30,000 last year to pay my bills, pay for my kid's college, and save some money. Verizon had $78 billion in profit. They want their $40 cost phone back, they can figure out how. Attitudes that allow companies to walk all over their customers are the reason companies walk all over their customers.

My apologies but I don't think I need to know your financial situation, what you pay for or what you save nor does that have any bearing on the conversation

 

[jeff_h]

This reminds me of an old saying "no good deed goes unpunished" -- if this happened to me, I would put it in the drawer with the rest of the old cell phones and in a couple years when you go to the "electronic recycling" turn-in then recycle this one along with the others.