The games cell phone companies play.

So, I log into my verizonwireless account this morning to see what I owe this month. Oh gee, apparently I have a $149 CREDIT. Hmmm, this is puzzling since I paid my bill in fully last month and didn't pay anything since then. Puzzling. SO, I check out the payment history and there, on May 4th is a $200 payment...in CASH. Further odd, since I only ever pay with my debit card, wouldn't even know HOW to pay with "CASH" in this case. Strange.

SOOOO, I call customer service, say, "Maybe you have more information about this than I do, but I'm looking at my bill online and see a large $200 payment that I DID NOT make. And it says it was paid with cash, I always pay with a credit card."

"Oh my," says the customer service rep. "Heather, a cash payment is a payment made in-store at a kiosk. Someone probably misentered their account number by one digit and it credited your account, Heather."

I say, "Not that I'd mind a huge credit on my bill, but it's not mine."

"Yes, Heather, and whoever paid that $200 will be surprised when it doesn't show up on their account. Heather, I'm gonna put you on hold while I speak with financial services and find out what to do, Heather."

(I'm NOT embellishing the number of times she managed to work my name into a sentence.)

"Okey dokey."

She comes back a minute later.

"Heather, I'm still holding with financial services, I just wanted you to know that I haven't forgotten about you."

"Cool, thanks."

She comes back after a few more minutes.

"Heather, it looks like we're going to be holding for quite awhile for the next available financial services representative. I don't want to keep you on the line that long, so I'm going to research this for you, Heather, and call you back when I have an answer."

"Alrightee, thanks."

So, she calls back a few minutes later.

"Heather, I spoke with financial services, and they told me to tell you to pay your bill as normal at this time. Your current amout due is $50.06. Just pay that as you normally would, and when the cash payment customer calls to find out where their payment has been applied, we'll take the credit off of your account at this time."

"Ok, thanks."

SO, I go back to verizonwireless.com to make my $50.06 payment. I hit, "Approve!" for my payment, and get an error...Basically the error is telling me that they know I have a big massive credit on my account, and their computers think I'm a dummy for continuing to pay a bill that's at least 3 months prepaid...some sort of "amount entered cannot be less than the amount due or must be equal to or greater than zero." Ok, makes no sense, but basically, it won't let me pay again online until this is resolved. SO, they tell me to pay my bill as usual and wait for someone to call and complain about a missing credit...BUT, I can't pay my bill until someone calls to whine...love it.