It’s my new life goal to cost your company $350. I’ll do it however I can. I figure if I can get a few people to ditch your service with me as their reason, that should do it.
Gosh that isn’t very nice of me is it? Well neither was the customer support staff that I dealt with. They were plain out rude.
Here’s what happened. I switched to Sprint because I wanted to be a Sprint customer. I got rid of my old AT&T iPhone and got a new Sprint iPhone 4S. This was on December 31, 2011. Upon getting home and getting it set up, I found I had very bad service in my home. I stuck with it for a few weeks, but it was no fluke, I just didn’t get service at all most of the time at my house. So I was forced to switch away. I went back to AT&T on January 26, 2012. That’s 27 days. I thought I’d do it within a month. But it turns out you only have 15 days Satisfaction Guarantee. So when I switched away, I was charged $350 termination fee.
Not only that, but the store wouldn’t take my phone back. So now I’m stuck with an iPhone 4S that doesn’t work on my new carrier. I’d eBay it, but the last time I did that I got scammed big time, so I’m just not looking forward to dealing with that again.
That’s OK. I’ll donate the phone to someone who can really use it. But you, for being so rude to me and not being willing to accept that I can’t use Sprint service because of the poor reception in my house, I’m going to get even with. I’ll update this post with how I’ve managed to cost you money.
@chriscoyier @sprint I’ll try to get my mom to ditch the service. Otherwise, I’m with another carrier. :)
— Alison Foxall (@alisonmf) February 15, 2012
@chriscoyier @sprint good to know. was thinking of switching to them but if they’re that awful, i’ll stick with verizon.
— jared (@imjared) February 15, 2012
@chriscoyier Ouch. I was just thinking of switching from AT&T, too. Bad coverage/service in general with Sprint?
— Harlan Lewis(@harlanlewis) February 14, 2012
This blog post and all the ensuing discussion at Sprint HQ should cost them at least $350 in general productivity, I would hope.
Never did intend on using sprint but now I know I won’t.
That sucks. Fortunately the PR higher-ups troll twitter and blogs for this kind of thing. They might “realize their terrible mistake” and offer you something in return.
Switching from Sprint to AT&T doesn’t seem like much of a move up, though, considering that they’re throttling unlimited plans to get everyone into the tiered structures.
I hope you get them back somehow.
P.S. I’m looking for someone to sell me an iPhone 4S so i can get into iOS development (proud member of Team Treehouse, hell yea). I’ve checked craigslist, but I’m worried about getting scammed too – if you care to part with it, I’ll buy it from you. You’ve got some fame on teh interwebs, so I trust you ;)
YES.
You don’t know how many times I’ve wanted to write a similar article expressing my frustrations with corporations who frankly, “Could care less” about a single person’s misfortune. I hope that you’re able to affect them half as much as Dave Carroll affected United Airline’s with his brief ditty about how they ruined his guitar.
Stick it to the man, Chris! I’m right alongside you!
Chris, when cancelling Sprint, they didn’t offer you an Airave?
I had the same problem and called them and they sent me one for free and waived all fees. You hook it up to your home network and it’s basically VOIP on your cell.
A few suggestions.
1. You could get a bunch of people to start clicking on Sprint’s PPC Google ads. Not sure how much their spending per click, but it has to be around the 5-10¢ mark.
2. Report site problems, which will cause Sprint to allocate man hours to investigate problems.
3. You could also post this on their facebook, sit back and watch them handle it like most corporate behemoths – horribly.
Chris,
Did you ask to speak with someone higher up the chain? You probably spoke to a dude who has no true power to change those conditions.
I am not defending Sprint or anything but sometimes you gotta aim a bit higher than a support dude. Rude I know, but it’s the way it is.
The only problem with your argument is that the 14 day return policy is now standard in the wireless industry. The reason for this is that Apple only has a 14 day return policy. Sprint changed theirs around the time they got the iPhone. So blame Apple, not Sprint.
You were lucky you were only a customer for less than a month. I was a customer for 6+ years, and received horrible service when I tried to get a new phone. Before you sign up they are a great company with tremendous discounts. If you’re already a customer, it’s almost like they’d rather you pay the termination fee than give you even a cent off a new phone.
Shoot me an e-mail if you want to sell that phone. I was gonna pick one up in a couple months when my contract is up anyway.
Wow – you signed a contract, reneged on said contract, and are mad because their company policy is to *follow* said contract and charge you the fee you agreed to pay?
This is such a ridiculous example of shamelessly entitled behaviour. But in context, it hardly even stands out. What really takes the cake is that now it’s your “new life goal” to cost them $350. That’s so ridiculously childish I’m practically at a loss for words.
I can only assume you were heavily under the influence when you made this post, and when you look back over it and read what your wrote you will delete it quickly in shame.
I fully admit I broke their contract, that I likely agreed to in writing. I’m just of the opinion that you don’t charge people $350 for breaking a contract on an unusable service. You don’t force them to keep a phone they can’t use. And you don’t be rude in your customer service emails and essentially accuse me of lying. If you do that, I’ll get mine. Childish or not.
That really stinks. I have been a service for about 7 years and have not had any problems with them, service has always been great, and I have used phone and in person support, always great. That just proves that if a service person is having a great day, the business looses money.
Hopefully you do stick it to them… If they are rude, they deserve it.