Came home just now to find two actual papery-type letter thingamajigs in my mailbox, both from Verizon. I've just joined them from AT&T.
 
The first was to confirm my request to sign up for paperless billing. That's right, a paper letter to confirm my request to receive bills by email. They did not send an email confirmation to the email address I signed up with. Why bother with emails when you can simply chop down a tree?
 
The second was confirmation of my registration for "My Verizon," their online account service. 5 days ago, they sent me an email confirming this registration, and added that they would also send me a letter saying exactly the same thing in 3-5 days. So I wasn't that surprised by this one. It doesn't make it any less ridiculous however.
 
I'm on the brink of filling my mailbox with bricks like Kramer. Stop sending me this paper crap, I hate it and it's so unnecessary. Is this a union thing to protect mail room jobs or something?
 
 
 

Have you ever considered that they simply hate trees? 

You would think they would just give you a phone call.

Maybe they have a warehouse full of paper that has to be used before it goes off. 

I expect there may be rules (or even laws) requiring that certain documents be sent to customers in a manner which is considered proof of service. In most states the mail to a known address will qualify, but an email may not be considered reliable. Ever heard of spam filters or email spoofing? And of course the USPS and the resident of the address you gave them, will likely tell them you are not resident there if you used a false or outdated address for a lot less cost then sending a private dick out. In any case the law may not have caught up with the internet quite yet, and your cell service may just want to make sure that they have you by the legal short and curlies in the event a dispute arises in the future.

Of course, if you really knew how your bill is calculated, it would probably make you far more annoyed than just receiving a couple of letters in the mail.
 
I actually did know in the early 2000's since I had to write the Recurring Charge logic for Verizon Wireless' billing system.  After calculating the basic total, the Federal Taxes are calculated, then each further tax and "surcharge" is calculated on the ongoing totals!  Yes, you are being taxed on your tax!  Plus, if you have hardware payments as part of your bill, you were charged a separate line of tax for this originally then these totals were added to the overall total prior to any further tax calculations.  Naturally, they have it all hidden into the details on the bill so you don't really know (and anyone you call on the phone has no clue).