Fighting the cellphone company...ugh

[DammitJanet]

Ok this was just what I wanted to do the first week day home from the week from hades...lol.

I went to pay my cell phone bill and noticed that I had roaming charges on my upcoming bill. This could only be from this past week when I was up at Jamies. I go no where else. So I immediately waddle my fat lil tuckus over to the counter and ask to speak with a customer service person to have them explain how such a thing could have occurred. I have a regional cell phone plan with Tmobile which includes VA, NC, SC and GA. I was in VA. I never left VA until I was back in NC.

Now this person at the local store just chuckled and said...oh this is going to be a problem, this happened to some of my family members when they went up to the inauguration last fall. They used their phone in Arlington VA and got charged roaming too. Hmmmm. Sounds like Tmobile has a problem then. They dont know where VA ends and Difficult Child begins. They need a MAP! I will be glad to give them one. Or they can try google earth!

Anyway...this guy in the local office says he has to call the "customer service" people at Tmobile. Fine...call them. The first lady went on and on about how I was roaming off of Difficult Child towers and that I was up too close to Difficult Child and yada yada. I told her...ummm...no...I was 45 miles from Difficult Child. That isnt close to Difficult Child. She offered to give me a 25% discount on the charges. Uh no! She switched me to her supervisor who was a jerk. He got very snotty with me and asked me if I had a problem with understanding what my plan entailed. Oh no...I understood my plan just fine...I dont think he understood my plan! He tried to get me to switch my plan to a more expensive nationwide plan but no...I dont want that. Then he took the cake.

He tried to lie to me and tell me that cell phone towers have a range of 2 miles and that my calls were all made from within 2 miles of cell phone towers IN Difficult Child! Ok...that is an out and out LIE! I know full well where I was when I made my calls and I was sitting in Jamies house and I can give him exact coordinates for gps satellite locations. They can even look up that data on their records if they wanted to. It is a lie that cell phone towers only have a range of 2 miles too. I was ticked. Oh I was ticked. He said the roaming charges wouldnt be removed. I asked him if he wanted to lose a customer that had been with Tmobile since 2003 for 60 bucks. He said he didnt care. I said well that was good to know.

If you are looking for a cellphone company...dont get tmobile!

 

[Shari]

After your trip with your daughter in law, and now this? I'm surprsied that sales rep is still standing....

 

[DaisyFace]

Janet--

I am so surprised to hear that you got such a hard time from T-Mobile! I've always found that their customer service was the best! (Now AT&T or Verizon, ugh!!--Don't even get me started!!)

This used to happen to us all the time when we lived very close to the Canadian border--our calls would get picked up by the Canadian towers (even though we never left the US!) and we would get charged for international roaming! Our only resource was to pay attention to the cell phone's status--if the display showed "Roaming" or a Canadian phone company, we knew not to make the call and would try calling from a slightly different location (maybe just down the block).

Hope you get the issue resolved!

--DaisyFace

 

[witzend]

I hope you got his name and number. Write a letter when you cancel and explain it. They'll figure it out.

 

[DammitJanet]

What is stupid is I made sure that my phone said Tmobile. I even had full bars.

Obviously they have service in Difficult Child but on the Nationwide plan. My phone said Tmobile when I was in Ohio but I knew that I would be roaming if I used it up there because...lets all say it together...my region is the south. I couldnt reasonably argue that Ohio should be not roaming nor would I.

I only know this guys name as Tom and dont have a clue what his number would be because he was called from my local store. I doubt that is even his real name because he knew he was dealing with an angry customer. He wouldnt give me any last name...I asked. Tomorrow I intend to call them back and ask to speak to a tier two retention specialist. If I dont get satisfaction there then I will just go as far as I can go with just paying the bill with paying the current charges and leaving the roaming charges to keep rolling over. If they cut me off...so be it. I will go to another company. They can send it to collections to never get paid.

 

[Star*]

Janet -

Call Tmobile back. Ask to speak to a Customer RETENTION specialist.

No one else - NOt customer Service either - Customer REtention Manager if you can get one.

THEY will remove stupid roaming charges.

I have Cingular -ATT and like them very well for this area. THere is a thing on the web that you can compare plans...but if you've been granfathered in since 2003 - dont' give up your price plan becuase of 1 idiot - try again with Customer RETENTION manager.

 

[Wiped Out]

Janet,
This would have me more than steaming! I definitely would call back like Star suggested! Hugs.

 

[Hound dog]

This is why I use track phone. lol

And also why I dumped att.....and went to cable for the house phone.

Try Star's suggestion, it can't hurt.

Hugs

 

[DammitJanet]

Daisy...Tracphone would cost me a gazillion dollars...lol. I use probably 1600 minutes a month for two phones because I use my house phone as my dial up connection so I dont even have a handset for it. Not only that, I cant even call long distance or 800 numbers on my house phone. If I could get cable here I would drop the house phone and get cable and probably get the magic jack as a house phone. Then most likely get something like Boost mobile as a prepaid for Tony to have and me just not have a cell phone anymore. He needs one though for work.

Star...I am calling the retention folks tomorrow. I cant believe they want to lose a customer that has two lines, once had 3 and has never ever been late or had the phone disconnected for late payments. Good grief. So many people jump cell companies like they change their underwear! They sign up to get the prettiest phone of the month and then cancel.

 

[Josie]

I think if you call the retention specialist, they will work with you. I called Sprint recently to drop one of our lines that is never used. They offered me a credit for $75 if I kept it. This is worth 3 months of continuing service. After 3 months, I can still cancel it.

I know you don't have Sprint, but my guess is that they are all trying to keep the customers they have.

 

[AnnieO]

Janet...

I recently dumped Verizon for T-Mobile.

Verizon hoovers. Customer service terrible, only had 2 bars & where I work has Verizon REPEATERS, and my signal even with 2 bars was horrible. Phones hoovered. Did I mention the customer service was AWFUL? Oh yeah, and I am paying $75 a month less now for two phones than I was on Verizon for less minutes & no favorites.

I have had nothing but good luck with T-Mobile so far. BFF lives in BFE (LOL) and I actually get service there. No roaming. I don't go out of town much, so it's not an issue. In fact I almost never leave town.

I agree, talk to the retention people. because... They will work with you.

 

[WhymeMom?]

Do you have a feature on your phone that you can shut off roaming? It may cut down on your phone calls, but would definitely keep the charges off and give you great standing if they do insist on charging you. The reason they "don't care if you are a customer or not" is you don't use all the services they can really ramp up the charges on. They really don't want to please you for $60/month...... sad isn't it? Good luck with cell service!!!

 

[susiestar]

If you don't get satisfaction from the retention manager, or do not want to bother, go to hoovers business directory online and get the corporate info for TMobile. You don't need any of the info the subscription would show.

Just get the CEO/COO names and corporate office phone numbers. Call the TOP.

Tell them the Tony guy that you talked to wouldn't give you a call back number or a last name/employee number. Tell them how HORRIBLE and RUDE the people you spoke to were. If someone was nice but couldn't help, tell them that too. (It can help your case to look like someone upset by a rude employee rather than like a difficult person that no one can satisfy. You get a LOT more out of people iwth that approach.)

Insist that you want the roaming taken off and want the minutes you have used in speaking to them reimbursed. If you need anything else from them this is the time to ask.

Tell them that you have never changed, not even when everyone else changed and got the new phones. You stuck by them, got new phones by renewing contracts but NOT by switching service.

Just keep a list of who you speak to, what they say, how they spell their name, what their title is, either a last name or an ID number (some companies won't let them give out last names so they get numbers, other companies are vice versa.).

What a stoopid hassle to give customers. YOU have no say in which tower the phone is using. There should be a certain amount of the roaming that you shouldn't have to pay for, esp if you can prove you were only in one area (letter from Jamie kind of thing). ESPECIALLY when this clearly happens often. Not to you, but to others.

I am sorry you have to battle over this. Keep track of everyone you speak to about this.