Ohio police are pissed with Verizon after the company refused to help them find a missing 62-year-old man unless they paid his overdue $20 $20 of his overdue cellphone bill.

The cops got a call that the man was rampaging around his house and breaking windows. When they arrived, the man had fled, taking bottles of pills with him. The sheriff contacted Verizon to ask them to turn the man’s cellphone cellphone service on so they could track his signal, but the operator said the missing man’s bill had to be paid first. After some back and forth, the sheriff started to make arrangements to pay his bill. Just as he was doing so, the search party, which consisted of two K-9 units, several fire departments, and more than 100 people on foot, found the man, unconcious, after 11 hours of searching.

“I was more concerned for the person’s life,” Sherrif Williams said. “It would have been nice if Verizon would have turned on his phone for five or 10 minutes, just long enough to try and find the guy. But they would only turn it on if we agreed to pay $20 of the unpaid bill. Ridiculous.”

See, the essential problem is that in most call centers you don’t get any bonuses for having humanity.

Unconscious Carroll man found after 11-hour search: Sheriff unhappy with Verizon’s ‘line’ on emergency [The Times Reporter] (Thanks to everyone who sent this in!)

(Photo: akshay moon, Maulleigh)