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4-8 hours a day for four months? Not a very good hourly wage for $610. I'm glad it turned out alright though.
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@Magspie: Yeah, I am not sure I would call 8 hours on the phone with ATT a victory, no matter what the outcome. Boo ATT.
I know 4-8 hours a day seems a bit much, but I really liked my AT&T service. The young man that was helping me with support, he was very thorough. We tried all kinds of things over the 4 months of troubleshooting, I honestly feel they did their job and was satisfied with the outcome, even though during the whole time I was \"big corporation\" paranoid.
I am just hoping that situations like this can become the norm with the information that sites like this provide. Companies, (and government) make their livings off providing services to us. They need to learn that they profit and prosper only by catering to the consumer or the people.(Within limits of course)
There was a time when I was younger that the companies which catered to us were the companies that survived and grew. Now it is about the HUGE profit and less about the customer.
It is not all the companies' fault however, the consumer needs to be smart and not just fall for the latest \"it\" or trendy thing, but do research, and if needed, use the less popular, less media fueled product to get better satisfaction and service.
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While it's great the OP got them to waive the fees, AT&T really had no leg to stand on legally to charge the fee.. the OP didn't move, or otherwise change the terms of service, AT&T did, by continuing to push services that their network clearly couldn't handle. The OP had been a customer (happily) long enough that they would have had to re-sign a contract to still have an ETF, so that would work as evidence that the AT&T service used to work, and 4 months of history of complaints that it didn't work I'm sure would be enough evidence in any court that AT&T wasn't holding up it's side of the contract. It's sad that it takes this much effort for a customer to keep what's theirs when the company is the party at fault.
@Andyf: Exactly. I thought there was some kind of clause that if you were no longer receiving signal you were free to cancel without fee.
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It's sad that a company doing the right thing warrants a story. Common sense and decency should be commonplace, but it just isn't. While I'm happy for the OP and enjoyed reading some good news, I'm distrought that this is even worth mentioning.
@Mike8813: AT&T didn't do anything wonderful for these people. They gave the couple poor service, let them call daily for 4 months and didn't make the service better or offer them a viable alternative, then refused to waive $610 in ETFs when the couple finally wanted to cancel. The couple was lucky that escalating the matter finally got them out of the contract (the terms of which had already been violated by AT&T) without paying even more for what they hadn't been getting. I'll grant that AT&T stopped doing the wrong thing, but it's a stretch to say that they did something right here.
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@Mike8813:
In all fairness, for every story we get about companies doing the right thing, there are at least 10 in which they don't.
In this case, I don't even think AT & T did anything that grand, though. What else could they do? They weren't providing the services that were contracted. Like someone said upthread, they didn't really have a choice.
I agree, this should have been just common decency. The reason it warrants a story is a sad product of today's society and business practices.
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\"Just remember to always be polite but firm when dealing with \"customer service\" or tech support. There are still good folks working those positions, folks like you and me\"
So if there are \"good folks\" working customer service positions these days, why is consumerist filled with stories whereby the only way to get a company to act reasonably is to go all the to the executive suits??
If these companies actually HAD competent service, an EECB would never be needed in the first place.
\"If these companies actually HAD competent service, an EECB would never be needed in the first place.\"
There's a big difference between \"competent\" and \"perfect.\" Even the best companies screw up sometimes.
Well I was speaking from my personal experience as a care representative for a major wireless provider. I damned sure had the ability to credit ETFs easily if need be, but I was threatened with my job if I ever actually did it.
Unfortunately service providers are insanely strict when it comes to ETFs and they will try as hard as they can to nail you to the wall on them before they finally cave and waive them.
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@dragonfire81: i think what they are saying is that the people who answer the phone when you call may really be nice people who just don't have the physical ability to make something happen.
for example - at my work, i can send out promotional items to customers. i can send one of each per order if necessary. the system will not accept an order for more than one of each item though. i can type it in, it will be rejected every time.
if someone wants 2 coffee mugs i have to send an email to the marketing department.
the power to make that decision has been taken away from me.
and to be fair, rarely does someone want 2 coffee mugs. we're not trying to be mean. they either want one or they want a case of them to hand out at a support group. which marketing likes to keep track of.
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@dragonfire81:
Not necessarily. There are tons of internal reasons or problems within a company or organization that results in a bad experience with a CSR or tech support person. Service doesn't come from a vacuum. It's a chain of information, transactions and work guidelines. If any of them get overtaxed, broken or diverted, you get 'incompetent service'. It's been my experience that, at least with call centers, the poorer the service the worse the back-end stuff is.
This may or not be off-topic (depending on your viewpoint) but I've had just about every wireless vendor (Cingular/ATT, T-Mobile under their old name, and Verizon) and only one that was worth a damn: Sprint. They always answer their phones with nary a hold time, their tech support always seems to have a clue as to what's going on, and the one single time things weren't resolved to my satisfaction (I am ver picky) there were apologies and callbacks from numerous parties up and down the line calling me back to make sure that things had been addressed. I'm cynical enough to see this as still a monetary decision (perhaps hoping to be known as the decent brand for customer service through word of mouth), but from what I can tell they are taking their customer sat VERY seriously. I do my best to reward them for it by telling people about how happy I am with them.
They don't have the iPhone, however.
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I hot changed Cell providers in 15 years.
in the last year i have learned I can not depend on my cell phone *AT ALL*.
After several calls ( including the service rep calling me back three time after each call drop ) AT&T waved my termination fees also.
I haven't had ATT Wireless, but I had a landline phone at our house for the past 18 years. I had two minor requests this year, about forwarding our calls to another number. The first one took 11 phone calls to resolve, the second took 7. For technical reasons, I probably won't be a landline customer again but it was a sad ending. Some of the representatives were absolutely useless, and even the good ones seem to have their hands tied.
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This site needs a \"like\" button!
Nice to hear a good story every now and then.
I'm glad the OP had a good experience. I can't stand AT&T, but when I lived at my parents house it was the only service we could get (few cell towers in that area). I live in a more urban area now and have been thinking about making a switch. I have an iPhone, and the one time I needed to take it to the apple store they were very warm and helpful. The 3 times I've been to an AT&T store I wanted fire to fall from the sky and crush everyone in the building! Honestly they couldn't be less helpful if they were asleep!
Next time I have a problem I'll be calling customer service instead of taking it to the store, sounds like the OP had the right idea.
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If something like this happened to me, I would file in small claims court for the 'early termination fee's' to be paid to me.
One phone call, one certified letter would be enough. No need to be jerked around talking to different CSR's.
And I would publicize the hell out of it if I won.
How dare a company fail to provide service and then try to charge the customer an ETF!
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If we all demand to get what we pay for - including decent customer service - even when it isn't easy, we will eventually win. I hope.
I hope it happens before I stroke out on the phone.
i don't love to hate any company...really kind of a waste of energy...
But if we pay a reasonable price and we expect reasonable products and services...
When they as an industry consistently fail in providing good service, then maybe the industry needs to wake up...
Either tell us we're gonna get crappy service for what we pay, and if we pay more get better service...
Or charge us cheaper rates for getting lower quality service...
Jeez, why not trust us with the truth, we're not dumb!
@subsider34: Letstalk.com sends you new ones, and you can cancel the \"mandatory\" data plan after 60 days
I know its hip to hate AT&T these days, but honestly, I've enjoyed their quality of service, and the customer service department has been quite nice to work with. The last time I had to call was for my girlfriend's phone. Since I get a nice discount on my plan, I decided to get her a line on my account as a birthday gift. We went to an AT&T store, wrote our name in the little book, and proceeded to wait. And wait. Aaaand wait. About 45 minutes later, one of the suited salespersons called our name. I explained what I wanted to do, and he didn't seem to have any issue with the idea. He prompted her to pick out a phone, immediately sending her to the most expensive section of the store. She wandered away from there until she found a 'free' one - $50 phone with $50 rebate and all that. \"We don't have that one\" he quipped. Nonplussed, she pointed to a different one. \"Or that one\" was his curt reply. She asked if they had any like it (indicating the price) and he went into the back.
He came out with a $400 phone that they \"just received.\" He barked out its bells and whistles, and was very happy to brag about its built-in GPS. \"What's GPS?\" was my lady's only reply (she may not be tech savvy, but she knows how to pop someone's balloon). \"It tells you where you are\" was the suit's *brilliant* reply. \"I can do that for free - I know where I am.\"
I had to walk away to snicker a bit. Anyway, they literally had 0 phones she liked for the price she was willing to pay (even though I was paying, she refused to have an expensive phone).
A little annoyed, we left the store and I called AT&T's customer service line. After some number jumping, I was in contact with a nice lady, whom after hearing my recent tale, offered to help out. I asked about the original phone my girl was interested in, and she immediately quipped \"oh yes, *I* have that one in stock. Lots of them.\" She offered to overnight the phone to us at no additional fee(!)
Needless to say, the next day my girl had a phone, and AT&T had a satisfied customer.
I guess the moral of the story is twofold: First, if you treat your customers like customers, then you will keep them. Second, don't go to an AT&T store.
@ReaveT: I used to do customer care for ATT and agree about the store reps being trained apes without the training. They'd call in to have us cancel people within the 30-day window because they were either too clueless to do it themselves or were trying to keep the commission. Although I was never trained on their programs, never even saw them, I learned enough about them on calls to tell people at the store how to do things on their own computers. \"What's it say on the screen now? Hmm, try clicking on....\"
There are maps of the network with the level of coverage both on the website and in their system. It's easy to see if someone has lousy coverage, where, and to submit a trouble ticket. It behooves the customer to ask for the rep to do them because it shows you've called in X times over Y months because you don't get coverage.
It's been a while since I worked there, but to cancel the ETF, all you needed to do was check a box on a screen and choose one of several reasons from a dropdown box. Not being able to use the network was one of the reasons. There was another along the line of 'they can't use us now but they might switch back if we improve the network and don't piss them off now.' I documented the reasons and never had anyone question the waiving of the ETF.
@ReaveT: You know, it's kinda the same thing, but (gasp) Bestbuy has the exact same phones (for AT&T) for less money than the AT&T wireless store next door.
You think someone would notice.