Can you hear which finger I'm extending now? Good!
I recently got a $220 cell phone bill from T-Mobile.
Evidently I went 400 minutes over my quota last month, which is surprising, because I rarely go 1 minute over my quota. I regularly check the number of minutes I have remaining, and if I start getting close to going over, I curtail my usage considerably. About 200 of those minutes are from believing mistakenly that holidays counted as weekends - I've been on plans where they did in the past. Another 150 come from a single call I had with stalwartkumquat that began the last night of my billing cycle and lasted for close to 4 hours. The call began an hour before I went in to unlimited night-time minutes, but apparently that doesn't matter. Even if I start the call at 8:59 pm, the whole call is considered to be an anytime call.
The bottom line is the vast majority of it is me being unfamiliar with the minutiae of my billing plan. I called them today and they quite nicely told me I was SOL. And I mean that - the woman was quite friendly and also said that they had no ability to refund me my money.
And I feel like cell phone companies are unique in this regard. If I make a mistake with paying my credit card bill, or with my bank account, I call them up, they see that I'm a good customer, and since they want to keep my business they waive my fees. I pointed out to the phone rep that my contract with T-Mobile is up in 2 months and she said she knew that but there was nothing she could do about it.
All of which is to say that I am in the market for a new cell phone company. I'm tempted to give AT&T Cingular Omnicorp. a try, especially if they still do GSM/SIM card phones. Otherwise...I'm kind of at a loss. Anyone have recommendations? Or places to steer clear of? I've talked to a few of my friends and the feeling that I get is that they all suck, they're all evil, and you'll hate them no matter what - in which case I should just try to find one that'll give me a nice phone for free.
Evidently I went 400 minutes over my quota last month, which is surprising, because I rarely go 1 minute over my quota. I regularly check the number of minutes I have remaining, and if I start getting close to going over, I curtail my usage considerably. About 200 of those minutes are from believing mistakenly that holidays counted as weekends - I've been on plans where they did in the past. Another 150 come from a single call I had with stalwartkumquat that began the last night of my billing cycle and lasted for close to 4 hours. The call began an hour before I went in to unlimited night-time minutes, but apparently that doesn't matter. Even if I start the call at 8:59 pm, the whole call is considered to be an anytime call.
The bottom line is the vast majority of it is me being unfamiliar with the minutiae of my billing plan. I called them today and they quite nicely told me I was SOL. And I mean that - the woman was quite friendly and also said that they had no ability to refund me my money.
And I feel like cell phone companies are unique in this regard. If I make a mistake with paying my credit card bill, or with my bank account, I call them up, they see that I'm a good customer, and since they want to keep my business they waive my fees. I pointed out to the phone rep that my contract with T-Mobile is up in 2 months and she said she knew that but there was nothing she could do about it.
All of which is to say that I am in the market for a new cell phone company. I'm tempted to give AT&T Cingular Omnicorp. a try, especially if they still do GSM/SIM card phones. Otherwise...I'm kind of at a loss. Anyone have recommendations? Or places to steer clear of? I've talked to a few of my friends and the feeling that I get is that they all suck, they're all evil, and you'll hate them no matter what - in which case I should just try to find one that'll give me a nice phone for free.