April 5, 2001

Losing a Cell Phone: A Pain Even Insurance Can't End

By SUSAN STELLIN

Anyone who has ever left a cell phone in the back of a cab, or reached into an empty pocket where a tiny phone was previously stashed, knows how Maryellen Nugent Lee felt last year when she watched her phone float down a stream in San Antonio.  But Ms. Nugent Lee, who works in public relations in New York, has gotten used to that feeling of momentary panic, and the hassle of getting a replacement: she lost seven cell phones last year and has lost two so far in 2001. "I must be the queen of losing cell phones," she said.

Although Ms. Nugent Lee is certainly more aware than most of this particular drawback of the wireless world, she is hardly alone. In the United States, 110 million people have cellular phones, according to the Yankee Group, a technology research and consulting firm in Boston. And as cell phones become smaller, they are easier to misplace.

While there are no readily available statistics indicating how many people lose their phones each year, a Yankee Group survey of 2,900 households with wireless phones last September found that 19 percent had bought cell phones in the last year to replace ones they had lost.

Most wireless providers offer insurance plans to cover loss, theft or damage. The plans generally cost $3 to $5 a month, with a deductible in some cases. But consumers who have tried to replace lost or stolen phones covered by such plans say they have some drawbacks.

For starters, the deductible can be as high as $50. But the biggest complaint seems to involve the insurance companies' requirement that customers file police reports for losses or thefts. Those who have made a trip to their local station houses say the police are not always eager to handle this task.

Bruce Hawkins of Santa Cruz, Calif., got a similar reaction when he lost his cell phone on a trip to Los Angeles and tried to file a police report. When he called the police station in the area where he had lost the phone, he said, "they said, `We don't do this, so maybe you want to try your local police.' " He added, "So I called the local police, and they said, `That's outside our jurisdiction, so call the area you were in.' "

After another phone call to the police in Southern California, Mr. Hawkins finally got a case number to give his insurance company, only to discover that the phone he had lost was not in stock at the time.

"They were really heavily trying to pressure me to accept this cheaper phone," he said, explaining that since he had a backup phone, he had kept calling back until the same model was in stock. "It's amazing how many little hoops you have to go through with these companies."

Even so, Mr. Hawkins said he still paid for insurance coverage — on the theory that if he could not reach into his pocket and come up with the cash to replace whatever he might lose, then the insurance was probably worth some hassle.

Brenda Raney, a spokeswoman for Verizon Wireless, said the company offered insurance as a convenience to its customers, but she pointed out that the programs were administered by independent insurance carriers. When a cell phone is lost or stolen, she said, the phone company enters the picture to make sure that the service is suspended. "The first thing you need to do is call your carrier so we can suspend the account," she said.

Verizon and AT&T do not have a standard policy limiting customers' liability for calls made on cell phones that have been stolen or misplaced; rather, the companies say they handle such situations case by case. A Sprint PCS customer is responsible for charges incurred before the company is notified about a lost or stolen phone, although a Sprint representative said special circumstances might be considered.

"If a customer calls and tells us their phone was stolen and there are calls on the bill that they did not make," Ms. Raney said, "we work with them to identify those calls so they won't be liable. Our intent is to treat the customer fairly."

Although all three wireless providers queried declined to share statistics on lost or stolen cell phones, Ms. Raney said that through Verizon's insurance program, "there are more claims for loss than theft."

Of course, in some cases it is difficult to determine whether a mishap is due to crime or carelessness. Al Rhoden, a Brooklyn lawyer, recently discovered that his phone was missing somewhere between the subway exit at 53rd Street and Fifth Avenue in Manhattan and an office building near Park Avenue and 55th. After retracing his steps, he said, he tried calling his cell phone and was surprised when someone answered and asked, "Who is this?"

"I said, `Excuse me, this is my phone,' " Mr. Rhoden said. "He said something in Spanish which I didn't quite understand and hung up. I thought to myself, the gall of this guy — he answered the phone as if it was his!"

Mr. Rhoden immediately called his service provider, Verizon, and was told that he would not be charged for any calls that might have been made. "They were quite decent," he said.

As for the incident itself, Mr. Rhoden's initial outrage seems to have faded. "This is New York," he said. "Everything happens here."

Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company