The other day Verizon was hammered for their decision to charge users an extra $2 if they wanted to pay their wireless bill either online or over the phone. While Verizon backed off the plan, we noted at the time that the press seemed to not notice that their plan isn't that unusual, with many, many ISPs charging extra fees to pay bills online, over the phone, or in person. Even Verizon charges such fees for some landline and DSL customers.
The Boston Globe is one of the few mainstream sites to notice this, pointing out that if users are going to be outraged at Verizon, they should also be outraged at AT&T, RCN, Comcast, DirecTV and plenty of other companies who -- as we noted some time ago -- have created a trend of forcing customers to pay a fee -- just to pay their bills. They break out the long list of ISPs doing similar fees highlighting RCN, who charges up to $7 in some instances but didn't want to talk about it:
AT&T Wireless charges $5 to make a payment in person with a clerk or via phone with a live agent. And T-Mobile USA: $5 by phone with an agent. Many cable TV providers levy similar fees. Comcast Corp., the region s largest cable television provider, charges $5.99 to make a payment via phone with the aid of a representative. And the two largest satellite TV providers, DirecTV and Dish Network, both charge $5 to make a payment through a representative. RCN, which charges as much as $7 for some types of payments, could not be reached for comment.
It's all part of a long-standing practice in the ISP industry (and now most other industries) to break out costs of business and place them below the line, allowing them to advertise a lower price -- then sock you with a variety of annoying fees. In this case Verizon didn't get away with it because users collectively complained, though you wonder why these folks weren't paying attention when other carriers implement such fees.read comment(s)