Verizon says “You gotta pay us for the privilege of paying us”

By Brian Schoeneman | Friday, December 30th, 2011 | Policy

If you haven’t heard the news, Verizon is  adding a $2 “convenience fee” for the privilege of paying your Verizon bill online. Despite the fact that Congress just banned credit card companies and banks from charging those fees for over the phone transactions, and despite the fact that ATM fees are some of the most hated of all fees, there are still corporations out there who want you to pay them for the privilege of paying them.

Because that’s exactly what this is: Verizon wants you to pay them for the privilege of paying them.

I’m a capitalist. I like making money. I like being able to invest money to make more. I like having a safe place to put my money and knowing that it will be there when I get up in the morning. I like profits. I like it when other people do well and make money, because it gives me something to aspire to.

What I don’t like is being taken advantage of. I don’t like being treated like I’m a moron. And I certainly don’t want to pay for that kind of treatment.

When did we, as a culture, start accepting this kind of nonsense? Was it when we rolled over and allowed banks to charge us fees to withdraw money from our own accounts? Or to penalize us for not using our bank’s ATMs? Is that what started this?

The worst part about ATM fees is that we’re being charged for using a service that actually saves the banks money – the cost of the number of physical branches and tellers needed to process just withdrawals alone costs a huge amount more than setting up ATM networks and transfering fees between banks. It’s ridiculous.

I can’t just fault Verizon for this idiocy, as they aren’t the pioneers. Plenty of other lenders and vendors do it, too. When I make my car payment online, I get the same thing – a $5 convenience fee. Again, I am paying them for the privilege of paying them. And it annoys me every time.

This kind of take-the-consumer-for-a-sucker approach is trickling down to other parts of the economy, too. My dry cleaner called the other day to tell us they found a rip in one of my wife’s blouses and asked if they should repair it. We said sure, and they said they’d add the extra cost to the bill. I pick up the dry cleaning yesterday and they added the cost to the bill – but didn’t fix the tear and didn’t even bother cleaning the clothes. I guess they figured we’d be too dumb to notice.

Here’s a tip for all the Verizons of the world: people are not sheep. We do not sit around waiting for the next company to come up with a new way to sheer us. But, unfortunately, between the banks, the phone company, utilities and other must-have purchases in life, too many companies are sitting around trying to find creative ways to squeeze a few more dollars out of already over-stressed working families and I, for one, am sick of it.

I’m willing to bet you are, too.

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