Your Loss is My Gain....Or Not

Six months ago I left my beloved Droid phone on an Amtrak train bound for Philadelphia from Washington D.C.  I had placed it down on the seat while I grabbed my luggage from the overhead bin.  And in the rush to detrain, I forgot all about it.  Normal age related forgetfulness, of which there have been far too many instances in my life after fifty.

Then the other day I got these two voice mails on my new Droid, which cost me the $100.00 deductible.  Which wouldn't be so bad if I hadn't dropped my original, original Droid in the toilet 12 months before this most recent incident.  The first claim had cost only a $50.00 deductible.  And that wouldn't have been so bad either if I had not traded in my original, original, original "Droid 1" phone in for a "Droid 2" phone, two weeks after I purchased it for $199.00.  The key pad on the original Droids were awful, so I paid $35.00 to trade it for the redesigned "Droid 2".  So to summarize, my current $199.00 Droid, which is Droid number four in under 2 years, has actually cost me $390.00.  Plus the approximately $7.99 monthly insurance premium.  And if anyone comments that I am an idiot for paying that much for insurance because you found this website where you get cell phone insurance for $0.99 I say, "big whoop".  Nothing is more tiresome than someone bragging about all the great deals they find online.  While they are surfing the web in search of saving $3.00 on an SD card, I am out riding my bicycle or hiking in the woods, or climbing a mountain, or saving teeth.

But I digress.  Here then are the voice mails, click the play arrow:

My first impression was that this guy is actually a good dude.  He realized I am a doctor because the message on my cell phone is informational for patients who are calling with a dental emergency.  He addressed me as "Doctor" and that's special to me since we often times get mail from people who know I am a dentist yet the letter is addressed to Mr. and Mrs.  And that annoys me.  It's not that I am a snob ( I am), but I paid a lot of money and expended a good potion of my youth to earn the title so it means something to me. So of course I immediately warmed up to the brigand who has possession of my lost phone rather than be mad that it wasn't immediately turned in.  Mr. Perry, after all, is not the person who appropriated the ill-gotten phone, he was just the one gullible enough to pay $100.00 for it.  Which I learned, by the way, because I called him. "Hello", I stated by way of introduction, "I understand you have my phone".  My strategy was that of trying to delicately coax a feral cat out of the bushes without spooking him into mistrusting me.  My tone was conversational and nonchalant, as opposed to confrontational and accusatory.

After politely explaining to me that he had purchased this phone from a "friend" for $100.00, he was merely contacting me, the original and rightful owner, to inquire if I would call Verizon to unlock the phone so he could use it.  It never even occurred to this well mannered young man that perhaps it should simply be returned to me.  Even after expounding on my side of the story such as the $100.00 it cost me for a new phone, the potential loss of personal data contained in a smartphone, and the hassles of having to reprogram a new phone to my specifications, he persisted in his negotiation for me to unlock the purloined phone.  He even offered me $50.00 to call Verizon and turn over possession.  "But it cost me $100.00" I stated as a counter offer. I persisted in the conversation because I was fascinated by the mentality that would allow a person to not have any empathy that perhaps I had suffered a loss as well.  Yes, he had been duped by his friend into buying an unusable phone, but how could he have the chutzpah to call me and not even express a "You lost your phone and that sucks, but why should we both suffer?" sentiment.

But, as I stated earlier, he had this endearing quality that I couldn't get mad at so I offered to call Verizon to research the implications of losing a smartphone and transferring ownership-if he would send me a check for $100.00.  "Get the money back from your friend and send it to me", I suggested as a logical strategy.
So we both agreed to pursue the matter more fully and that was that.   I called Verizon and was shocked to learn that locked and stolen phones are auctioned on e-bay all the time to gullible bidders.  I further learned that unless I called the police, Verizon has no obligation to do anything about it..  They lock the phone from being used to make calls and web browsing but if you took some compromising pictures with it, you are out of luck.  Fortunately for me, there were no passwords nor embarrassing pictures on the phone.
But I am still waiting for my $100.00 check from Mr. Perry.

Post Script: I believe there is a new regulation making its way through congress that would require all cell phone carriers to maintain a national data base of stolen phones so that there will no longer be a market for them.