The Sprint "Customer Disservice" Saga
We used to have our cellphones with Sprint. When TQO went to IBM, we found that IBM has an agreement with Verizon and our total bill would be much better if we went to Verizon. So he moved over first and found that reception was much better, but that could just be that newer phones have better antenas. Then when my contract was done with Sprint, I moved. Chris was on Virgin with pay as you go and Colleen was still on the Sprint account. She paid me monthly for their phones and Chris's extra cable box which was a painful twenty minutes a month of maintenance for me. Also, Chris had been trained to what a reasonable amount of phone usage was and seldom ran out of minutes. We decided he had graduated to a regular phone. The plan was that we would get a phone for Chris, change the plan to cover the two of them rather than the three adults (including TQO's oncall usage) and send the bill to the house where she would pay it. All I'd have to do is check online to make sure it was paid. When the phone contracts expire she would probably be in a position of financial recovery from her divorce to move to her own account.
Simple, right? Yeah.
I called sprint and told them what we wanted and then put her on the phone to select the phone for her son. What ensued was almost an hour of confusion in which she got two, not one new phone numbers. She repeatedly told them she wanted only one new phone and at one point she yelled that into the phone. I distinctly remember hearing her say "I don't care if both phones are free, I only need one phone. Why did you give me two numbers? Don't send me two phones!" We also requested mail invoicing and that they turn off the automated bill pay. They told me that was done. This was mid September.
They sent her two phones. And the saga began. Chris starts using his phone on 9/27 and we start trying to fix that other phone. I called Sprint and they were very polite. No problem, we'll send you a shipping label for FedEx and we will refund any charges for this phone, it's our error, so sorry.
No label arrives. She calls them. Sprint does not see any record of a request for a shipping label and why does she want to terminate this contract? So she tells the story from the begining. Oh, sorry, Sprint says, Our BAD, we'll send you a label.
Label comes. She has to call them, another hour on the phone and get a code number to indicate how the label should be processed when it comes in. Again, reassurances that when the phone arrives, they will credit us for all charges.
So, late October, I get an ebill for $280 and they draft my account. Thinking that Chris has gone nuts with unlimited I rush to the computer and log into read the invoice. Nope, usage is fine. The 'free' phone that we did not ask for had a $20 activation fee, a net $40 charge after all rebates for the phone, and the one we did ask for had a $20/$20 charge. Add to that, two phone lines are the same as one on this new plan but the third line, you know, the one we never asked for, that's another $12 plus tax.
So I call them. They have no record of having received the phone. They assure me that they will reimburse everything when the phone gets there because that code on the label will take care of things, but until then they can do nothing for me. I inquire why it took FedEx four days to get the two phones to me, but two weeks to get one back to them, but they are not interested in that line of reason.
I get another bill. This one is for $340. There is a charge for the third line and a $200 fee for early termination of our 'contract' for the phone we never requested. I am angry. I am white hot angry. So I call them back.
Now we switch from polite but ineffective to rude and insulting. They tell me that I 'kept' my phone too long before 'cancelling' it and all charges for early termination of that 'contract' are in effect. They are counting from the first day that I ordered the phone(s) until the day they posted receiving it. Not from the day that we got the phones, the day that they were activated by Sprint, the day we reported having two phones, the day we finally received a valid return label, the day we called in for the return code, no, from the first phone call!!!! And I am told this in terms of distrust as if somehow I am running a scam on them with a phone that has never initiated by us and which now is in their hands!!!
Several hours of yelling and asking for managers latter, escalating me through Indian accents to Latin accents to English accents to Midwest accents, I finally get someone who will read the past problem tickets and agree that they promised 6 weeks earlier to reimburse us for all charges. Sorry, Midwest said, somewhat reluctantly, we will 'waive' the cancellation fee.
EXCUSE ME? You can't "WAIVE" something you never should have charged me in the first place!
She said it would go away in 24 hours. I waited 24 hours. It's still there.
During this 24 hours, I wrote up a blow by blow description of what happened and line item charges with dates that I want fixed. By this time, I also want an apology. I also list the amount of time we have spent on the simple act of switching the teenager from Virgin to Sprint. I figure that I have been charged $264.64 I should never have been charged and between Colleen and I we have spent 12 hours either on the phone or driving the unwanted phone to FedEx. I call them back to get an address to send my missive. They refuse to give me such an address. They want to handle it over the phone. The young man, Gabriel, who has a Latin accent, is very polite. He actually reads the problem tickets and apologizes for my inconvenience. I laboriously read to him every line item I want removed. He agrees with me. Says he will 'escalate' my refund so that I can get it 'early'....you know, the one I should have already received???? He also offers to send me a confirmation email that lists the line items to be refunded.
Within four hours, I am refunded $215 bucks on my account. That's the 'waiving' of the cancellation fee. I never received a confirmation email. And I have not yet gotten the total, which includes the balance of charges for a phone they now have, activation fees for a phone we never requested and the third line charge for a third line we yelled at them that we did not want before they ever set it up. Probably all of this is because some bozo in India got a commission out of sending us an extra phone we did not ask for, or possibly cannot understand English well enough to do his job. But the total string of incompetence and down right rudeness is just stunning.
Lesson - you cannot believe ANYTHING they tell you on the phone and the only way you are allowed to interact with them is on the phone.
Question. Would you call them back and try to get the other fifty bucks worth of refunds? Is another hour of my time in call center hell worth fifty bucks?
And, oh yeah, I'm making this post public. I hope every internet crawler in the world gets this one. I can't send a letter to Sprint, but I can send it to the world.
Simple, right? Yeah.
I called sprint and told them what we wanted and then put her on the phone to select the phone for her son. What ensued was almost an hour of confusion in which she got two, not one new phone numbers. She repeatedly told them she wanted only one new phone and at one point she yelled that into the phone. I distinctly remember hearing her say "I don't care if both phones are free, I only need one phone. Why did you give me two numbers? Don't send me two phones!" We also requested mail invoicing and that they turn off the automated bill pay. They told me that was done. This was mid September.
They sent her two phones. And the saga began. Chris starts using his phone on 9/27 and we start trying to fix that other phone. I called Sprint and they were very polite. No problem, we'll send you a shipping label for FedEx and we will refund any charges for this phone, it's our error, so sorry.
No label arrives. She calls them. Sprint does not see any record of a request for a shipping label and why does she want to terminate this contract? So she tells the story from the begining. Oh, sorry, Sprint says, Our BAD, we'll send you a label.
Label comes. She has to call them, another hour on the phone and get a code number to indicate how the label should be processed when it comes in. Again, reassurances that when the phone arrives, they will credit us for all charges.
So, late October, I get an ebill for $280 and they draft my account. Thinking that Chris has gone nuts with unlimited I rush to the computer and log into read the invoice. Nope, usage is fine. The 'free' phone that we did not ask for had a $20 activation fee, a net $40 charge after all rebates for the phone, and the one we did ask for had a $20/$20 charge. Add to that, two phone lines are the same as one on this new plan but the third line, you know, the one we never asked for, that's another $12 plus tax.
So I call them. They have no record of having received the phone. They assure me that they will reimburse everything when the phone gets there because that code on the label will take care of things, but until then they can do nothing for me. I inquire why it took FedEx four days to get the two phones to me, but two weeks to get one back to them, but they are not interested in that line of reason.
I get another bill. This one is for $340. There is a charge for the third line and a $200 fee for early termination of our 'contract' for the phone we never requested. I am angry. I am white hot angry. So I call them back.
Now we switch from polite but ineffective to rude and insulting. They tell me that I 'kept' my phone too long before 'cancelling' it and all charges for early termination of that 'contract' are in effect. They are counting from the first day that I ordered the phone(s) until the day they posted receiving it. Not from the day that we got the phones, the day that they were activated by Sprint, the day we reported having two phones, the day we finally received a valid return label, the day we called in for the return code, no, from the first phone call!!!! And I am told this in terms of distrust as if somehow I am running a scam on them with a phone that has never initiated by us and which now is in their hands!!!
Several hours of yelling and asking for managers latter, escalating me through Indian accents to Latin accents to English accents to Midwest accents, I finally get someone who will read the past problem tickets and agree that they promised 6 weeks earlier to reimburse us for all charges. Sorry, Midwest said, somewhat reluctantly, we will 'waive' the cancellation fee.
EXCUSE ME? You can't "WAIVE" something you never should have charged me in the first place!
She said it would go away in 24 hours. I waited 24 hours. It's still there.
During this 24 hours, I wrote up a blow by blow description of what happened and line item charges with dates that I want fixed. By this time, I also want an apology. I also list the amount of time we have spent on the simple act of switching the teenager from Virgin to Sprint. I figure that I have been charged $264.64 I should never have been charged and between Colleen and I we have spent 12 hours either on the phone or driving the unwanted phone to FedEx. I call them back to get an address to send my missive. They refuse to give me such an address. They want to handle it over the phone. The young man, Gabriel, who has a Latin accent, is very polite. He actually reads the problem tickets and apologizes for my inconvenience. I laboriously read to him every line item I want removed. He agrees with me. Says he will 'escalate' my refund so that I can get it 'early'....you know, the one I should have already received???? He also offers to send me a confirmation email that lists the line items to be refunded.
Within four hours, I am refunded $215 bucks on my account. That's the 'waiving' of the cancellation fee. I never received a confirmation email. And I have not yet gotten the total, which includes the balance of charges for a phone they now have, activation fees for a phone we never requested and the third line charge for a third line we yelled at them that we did not want before they ever set it up. Probably all of this is because some bozo in India got a commission out of sending us an extra phone we did not ask for, or possibly cannot understand English well enough to do his job. But the total string of incompetence and down right rudeness is just stunning.
Lesson - you cannot believe ANYTHING they tell you on the phone and the only way you are allowed to interact with them is on the phone.
Question. Would you call them back and try to get the other fifty bucks worth of refunds? Is another hour of my time in call center hell worth fifty bucks?
And, oh yeah, I'm making this post public. I hope every internet crawler in the world gets this one. I can't send a letter to Sprint, but I can send it to the world.