Check your phone bill – customers fume over bill charges: ‘Greed is mad’

They really crossed the line this time.

Verizon Wireless is being accused of obfuscation and “greed” after eagle-eyed users noticed they charged an unpopular secret fee.

“I just looked at the online PDF of my current bill and was faced with a note that the Verizon rate is going up again,” the disgruntled user stated in a post that started on Reddit.

They said the rate will now be “$3.50 per voice line and $1.60 per data line” — up from $3.30 per voice line and $1.40 per data line, The Verge reported.

Representatives for Verizon – which is the largest telecommunications firm in the US by revenue – confirmed the rate increase.

“Beginning December 18th, the monthly Verizon wireless Administrative and Telecommunications Recovery fee will increase by $0.20 per line for cellular voice (base phones, Number Two, smartphones, etc.) and products with data (hotspots, tablets, etc.)”. Verizon spokesman George Koroneos told The Verge. “Verizon Home Internet services are not affected.”

According to Verizon, the additional payment “helps defray and recover certain direct and indirect costs that we or our agents incur.”

These include property taxes, operations and fees necessary to meet “regulatory and industry obligations and programs.”

However, the Redditor argued that this fee is often hidden in the billing details and forces customers to foot the bill for operations expenses they thought should be “baked into” the user’s standard plan.

“It’s the fee Verizon charges for the cost of doing business with them,” the Redditor quipped in a follow-up post. “They confuse it by calling it the Administrative Recovery and Telecommunications Fee. But basically it pays for their property taxes and other costs of doing business.”

They likened the charge to having to pay an extra electricity charge after buying an appliance at Target.

Redditors were less than thrilled with the fee hike.

“Greed is crazy,” declared one outraged user, while another called the add-on “fraudulent.”

“How come they don’t stop this practice? said a third. “I smell government action on this.”

This is not the first time the telecommunications firm has come under fire for roaming charges, which apparently rose from 40 cents a month for each phone line in 2005 to $3.30 in 2022.

Last winter, Verizon Wireless agreed to spend $100 million to settle a class-action lawsuit that claimed this administrative fee was unfair — with customers eligible to receive up to $100 each.