Verizon, 0.002¢, and .99¢
Written on December 23, 2006 – 11:11 am | by Ed Warkentin
I just ran across this:
http://verizonmath.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gp0HyxQv97Q&eurl=
This is a recording of a customer support call to Verizon wireless. The issue is whether 0.002 CENTS is different from 0.002 DOLLARS. The Verizon rep doesn’t seem to understand this. The infinitely patient, yet persistent, caller tries to explain this to the rep. Depending on your personality, you will be entertained, aggravated, or both.
My reaction was, “This would be hilarious if it weren’t so sad and frustrating!” I suppose we as educators would have a unique perspective on things like this…
Before I change the subject: A follow-up to this story (before you all get ticked off at Verizon and call them to set their little math-ignorant brains straight) is that they did, finally, respond appropriately – they adjusted the caller’s bill, and they educated their call reps. This is a powerful lesson about how one individual, through using Web 2.0 tools, can really make a change! All those listening to the YouTube recording of his call were educated (if not merely entertained). A company changed it policy, etc. Kinda interesting…
I’ve been sort of on a crusade for many years to make sure that any student that goes through my classroom knows darn well the difference between 99¢, $0.99, and .99¢ I’ve been shocked with how many times I’ve seen prices marked .99¢ in stores, and on big signs. I’ve put pictures of errors in stores on my school website.
I even took the price (.99¢) off of something at the local Rite-Aid, and had my students all write letters to the manager, correcting the error. The guy felt really bad – kept asking me, “How old are these kids?”, like he was embarrassed… I didn’t do it again.
Buuuuuuut…… I might have the kids find an error and blog about it. I wonder how many students will take me up on that invitation.
One time, my dad (a high school math teacher) paid at Baskin-Robbins by putting a penny on the counter and saying “keep the change.” – a single-scoop was advertised as .99¢ (you know – almost a penny!) I don’t recall if he went through with it, and didn’t go back to pay what they MEANT to charge, or if he left it…
One Response to “Verizon, 0.002¢, and .99¢”
I just finished listening to the UTube Verizon Customer Service phone calls. Wow. I don’t know why I’m surprised. But a company whose very existance is based on charging people for using their services for specific amounts of time just seems like it should employ some people that know how to do math and can further more explain that math to its customer service reps. Seeing as the job of a customer service rep, aside from selling products, is to explain people’s bills to them in a mathematically accurate manner. Apparently, that’s expecting a little too much. Hopefully they have hired some of those people who know how to do math, what are they called again? oh yeah mathematicians!
By the way, Dad did follow through with paying only 1 cent for the ice cream sandwich that was priced .99 cents. He said, “I see this ice cream is on sale for only .99 cents. Wow, do you realize that amount is less than a penny?! Here’s a penny, keep the change.” He then proceeded to walk out the door while eating the very low priced dessert! I know this because I was in the store when he saw the price and I knocked over an old lady trying to get out of there before he got to the check out counter! Well, maybe there wasn’t an old lady but I certainly got out of there as quickly as humanly possible because I knew what was coming. He was so proud of himself and had a huge grin on his face while he relayed the whole converzation!
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