March 07, 2005
Cingular, why do you taunt me so?
Lesson learned (without reading the rest of this post): Keep a record of all complaints and the names of people you talk to at customer service centers. If I wouldn't have had the name of Tom (My Cingular Customer Service Rep), I would've been given the run around. Also, it'd be a good idea to keep a note of what was said during the convo for future reference. Also as a last bit of advice I got from my Dad a while back... if talking on the phone doesn't work, write letters. It's hard to ignore something that's in writing, but it's easy to say no over the phone or by email. I was directed to someone who was supposedly her supervisor but was definitely a stutterer, which only made me more irate.
How I cancelled my Cingular contract after 30 days:
A few weeks ago I wrote a post about my current cell phone having poor coverage at my house. At the time I was able to convince Cingular, my cell phone provider, that since I started working with them well before the thirty day limit on returns was up, I should be able to cancel my contract as if it were still under thirty days. After all, they're the ones who kept telling me to wait and see if their current fix-all solution fixed my problem.
They told me that I could cancel my cell phone contract, but only if one last possible solution didn't work. They told me they'd call me in a week to walk me through the necessary steps, but I never got a call. Tom, my friendly service rep also said he would call in a week (the day before tech support was supposed to call) to see if matters had improved.
Neither call came on time, and the only call I did get was from Tom. He apologized for not calling on time, but he'd had a family emergency of some sort and didn't get into work the day before.
Anywho, tonight I started the cancellation process. I called the 1800 number and talked to the first customer service rep I was directed to. She said she wasn't able to authorize the cancellation without charging me the $200 early termination fee. I tried to tell her that Tom had OK'd it with his supervisor and that if she could look at my notes, he probably made a note of it on my account. Well, he didn't make a note, and I was tired of arguing with her. So, I asked to speak to her supervisor.
I tried to explain my situation again. I repeatedly told him that I understand the normal policy is that after 30 days, I'm stuck with the phone and the contract, but Cingular Customer Service told me that I was OK'd to have my early termination fee waived. He wasn't having any of that, so I started telling him the names of the people I spoke with. When I started name dropping, I asked him to look up the employees name and find out if I could contact him. He started looking, and finally came up with the employee number de Tom, and his manager's name.
He told me he'd e-mail his manager and let her know the situation and that she'd get back to me. However, since I've had three people from cingular make promises about calling me back only to fail to do so on time, or even call at all in two cases, I asked him for the manager's number if it was available. I ended up actually getting her number and calling her directly, long distance, in California.
She remembered the conversation, made me repeat the story of what happened and finally cancelled my contract and waived my termination fee.