A GOOD wireless purchasing experience.
 

Today we switched cell providers, and it honestly could not have gone better.

We wanted to find a new provider because the service around our home with Cingular is spotty. So, based on prices and recommendation from Motorboatcrusier, we were looking at Sprint. We shopped online, found the plan and phones we wanted and were ready to go, but to transfer our phone numbers, we apparantly had to either call or go into a store. Can't do it online.

I hate doing this kind of thing over the phone, so we made a trip to our local store. Now, 2 years ago, we went through hell trying to renew our overage and upgrade our phones. Conflicting information combined with crappy customer service policies mean having to cheat the system (not my doing, they gave me wrong info, and therefore they had to honor what they told me) to get a decent deal. So I was prepared for the worst.

Miraculously, this was painless. Perhaps because we came prepared. We had printed out the exact details of the plan, phones, and options we had selected online, along with the prices. So we walked in and showed the sales rep what we had picked out. They didn't carry the phone we wanted. Damn. But, a manager immediately took a look at it and said, "Well, okay, we can give you this upgraded phone for less instead." Hmmm, that might be good, but part of the reason we liked this phone was that it was compatible with the accessories (namely car charger) of our old phone. No problem, we'll take 50% off the car chargers.

Wow. Well, we saw that the plan we wanted was $10 more per month than quoted on the web (or, rather, they didn't have the plan we wanted listed as one of their options in-store). No problem, they gave us the plan we had selected.

This happened 3 or 4 times. We just said, "We can get it on the web for X", and, with absolutely no argument, they said, "Okay, you can have it for X". Down to waiving the activation fee. Everything was explained in detail to us and given in writing. And we walked out with 2, free, camera phones ready to go. I knew we had done well when the sales clerk went to ring up the final sale and had to have a manager come over to ener his authorization code to allow the discounts we were getting. And within an hour, our old service was automatically canceled, and the new service working.

So, for customer service alone, I highly recommend Sprint if you're looking. I never expected such a painless, friendly process from a cell company. Good for Sprint. But I do also know that part of the reason it was so painless was that we went in there educated. We knew exacly what we wanted, and exactly what we should be paying for it. The best favor you can do yourself if you're going the in-store route and know as much as you can beforehand and bring it in writing. They want those in-store sales and WILL work with you to get it.

I'm glad to hear that it went well for the both of you. Matthew and I are very happy with our service. Granted, we've never really needed to call customer support for anything so I don't know how good/evil they are.

Did you get the sprint to sprint service? That saves us a lot of money due to the fact that we call each other frequently. Also, having the free minutes start at 7pm rather than 9 probably has saved us a bundle as well.

Of course the best part is that now we can call you for free. :)

Now with extra cruisy! ;)

:p

We got a family plan, includes mobile-to-mobile to any Sprint customer.

We didn't get the extended night and weekend times simply because we never come anywhere close to using all of our minutes. Not worth it for us.

Make sure you call Cingular and tell them they need to stop billing you asap.

oops.

We've only had good experienced with the Sprint customer service. Unfortunately, I've not had very good experience with the quality of their phones or the consistency of service.

But we have a decent plan and I don't really use my phone much so I just muddle through with it.

Son of a...

Well, I'll get to find out first-hand how good their customer service is. :mad:

See, when we went in, we explained that our service contract wasn't quite up yet with our old provider, so we were either just shopping, or we'd buy the phones but delay activating them for the 2 weeks until our contract was up. But they said no need, there's a 30 day grace period.

Well, I just logged into Cingular's site to check the status of the account...we've been charged the $350 early termination penalty.

Guess who gets to sit on hold at lunch today!

Actually, I'd contact the Sprint Store we dealt with. They should have to deal with that.

(i'd do it myself but you're the primary)

Yeah, that's who I was actually planning to call.

Well gosh, it turns out that the 30 day grace period is if your previous contract was already with Sprint, not if you were with another company. :rolleyes:

But here's the thing, there's no way this was just a misunderstanding on my part, failing to make clear that I wasn't with Sprint before. The sales rep dialed Cingular customer service herself so I could retrieve my account number (nevermind that she also had to enter the account number and carrier in to transfer the phone numbers). So she knew full well that it wasn't a Sprint contract I was cancelling.

I'm betting it was HER who didn't know there was a difference. She went to her manager to ask about it, I bet she failed to make it clear to him that we weren't with Sprint. He assumed we were and told her, "Don't worry, 30 day grace period."

So they're "looking into it" at the store and I'm waiting for a return call.

So much for my first painless cell phone signup.

Ugh....that really sucks.

I really hope they resolve this obvious screwup on their part. One of my biggest pet peeves is when sales associates are not 100% knowledgeable of the details of the products/services they sell. Hopefully it can be resolved through the store without having to go the corporate route.

They never called him back.

He went straight to the store after work and they said "this has never happened before." They tried to make him call Cingular himself and he said look, you gave me the wrong information, you are the ones liable. They didn't do crap for him at the store so now he's calling Sprint directly.

I'd appreciate your prayers at this point :rolleyes:

Actually, there's no way in hell we're paying that, no matter what happens. :mad: I'll kick some ass myself...

Success.

So, the people at the store were...useless. "We've had tons of Cingular customers, and they've never been charged." Well, that's peachy, they're charging me. "Well, you can either call them and beg them to waive it, or just switch back and they'll waive it." :rolleyes: The whole point was to get away from them, plus YOU gave me wrong info, YOU fix it. Nope.

So I called Sprint CS directly. The CSR says, "Oh, you'll have to talk to the store, we can't do anything." Uhhh, lemme talk to a supervisor. "They can't do anything for you. Still want to talk to one?" :rolleyes: YES.

In the process of transfering to a supervisor...I get cut off. Joy.

But, that actually worked out for the best. I called back immediately, got a different CSR. I told her I just got cut off while being transferred to a supervisor, she asked what the problem was. Her response was, "Oh, wow, that's not good. I've got a supervisor standing next to me, one sec." She put me on mute, and a minute later came back and said the $350 would be credited to my account. And then asked for the store's phone number and the sales person's name. :D

It took a little, but I finally talked to the right person. Thanks Jill!

Not that they should have given you the wrong information but it is generally not a good idea to rely on Vendor B to tell you the truth about Vendor A when they're describing something that Vendor A will do to make it easier to switch to Vendor B.

Glad you found someone who could work it out for you though.

That ocurred to me, but I realized that as long as I made sure to get everything in writing and get the names of who told me this, if they were wrong they'd be the ones on the hook.

You already know my feelings about Cingular...
 

So I'll just say once you pay off Cingular keep that last statement for a very long time and watch your credit report to make sure they don't stick a negative on there.

They have a history of sending people to collections after they buy themselves out.

When a cingualr store tried to pull a fast one on me I called their customer service. the store was trying to say the free phone would cost $25.00. Customer service credit $60.00 on my bill. So, I went in and paid the $25.00, but came out ahead anyway...:) I've only had good experinces with cingular call centers. I will not go into any cingular store again.

I've been without a cellphone for over a year now... what a wonderful year!