Verizon to Introduce New “Talk to the Dearly Departed” Phone Service

Verizon’s new “Talk to the Dearly Departed” phone plan, which promises to allow customers to communicate with their deceased relatives and loved ones over the telephone, is set to be launched by the telecommunications giant later this month.

The service, which employs the company’s patented Transcendental Network Technology, is being promoted as a novel medium capable of bridging the mortal realm with that which lies beyond at an initial rate of fifty dollars a minute, and judging from testimonials of select customers during it’s trial stage, the network’s performance has proven to be anything but a complete disaster.

Verizon customer Mark Brady of Washington D.C. described his first experience with the new service: “I talked to my dad for the first time since he passed away last June through Verizon’s ‘Talk to the Dead’ plan.  There was a lot of static on the line, but after a lot of ‘Hi dad, this is Mark’s and ‘huh-what’s’, he asked me what the deal with those Redskins is and told me my mom wasn’t around because she hadn’t died yet so I’d have to call back later, so I’m pretty sure it was him.”

Janice Foster, whose son Jesse died of leukemia when he was eight years old, labeled the new service “miraculous” after enjoying a conversation with her deceased child.

“It was so good to talk to Jesse and hear that he’s happy.  He said he was in heaven where he gets to run and play everyday and eat ice cream served by angels, which really convinced me, because my Jesse loved to laugh and play and eat ice cream.  Then after a few minutes he said he was tired from frolicking and was going to take a nap on his bed of clouds.  I sat and listened to him snooze for hours.” 

Not everyone who used the system has been completely satisfied, however.

“I told the Verizon operator that I wanted to speak with Francis J. Goldman, and through a storm of static comes this guy who sounded like some rabbi from Crown Heights,” griped Sarah Goldman of New York City, “Which is odd considering my mother was a woman and wasn’t Jewish.  She married a Jew and lived in Michigan.  When I brought these facts up to the man on the phone, he told me that he was my mother’s soul and that souls are holistic and therefore might sound like a man, a woman or even a Jew.  It left me skeptical.”

The “Talk to the Dearly Departed” phone service is scheduled to begin Christmas Day.