[daphne]

Oh my God.

Jesus.

Cell phones.

What more can I say?

I have to detail this or I won't believe it happened, so please bear with me. Do me the small courtesy of bearing witness to my testimony of the archaic and terrifying world of customer service.

It was a dark and stormy night. Suddenly, a shot rang out...

Oh wait, that was something I found Gator typing on top of his doghouse. Wait a minute, he doesn't have a doghouse! Back to the story. Kurt's cell phone died last month. No biggie. It was the free NOKIA Crapmastah'blabbah' model 6000 with no upgrades. I was due for a 150 dollar upgrade last year. We decided to give me the new phone and give him the old one I have, because the old one gets spankin' good reception and has 2 batteries and he's driving 2000 miles this week to Missouri. And, I like the pretty new one because it's twinkly.

OK.

So, this past three days, I've been calling Sprint to get everything switched. First, we hit Radio Shack for the new phone. It took us, and I'm not kidding, an hour and a half to purchase the new phone, switch my number, check the account, and attempt to upgrade the old one. The kids working at Radio Shack in Lacy are very, very nice; and I don't mind their incompetence, because they knew more than customer service at this point.

I'm thinking to myself, where's Assblaster 2000 when you need her? I picture her somewhere, helping some LUCKY person, with her cape flowing behind her from some unknown wind source, while a halo glistens overhead. I hear angels singing her praises. Sigh. (actually, I did get this funny vision in my head, and it made me giggle. i'm silly like 'dat.)

Then, we find that we can't put my old phone on Kurt's account and his number because my phone needs a "flash upgrade" that only a Sprint Store can do. OK, no biggie, right?

Well, uh, no.

Yesterday, as I checked my online account, it says that I'm 85 dollars in the hole, which is impossible, because I paid for the entire month online on Sep. 3rd. I check my bank. Yes, not only did I pay, but they charged me a dollar when they said online it was a free transaction. So, I call the bank on a whim. Sprint's financial people charged me a dollar until I sign up for an ebill.

Whatever.

That takes us to yesterday's evening. I tried to call Sprint to verify that they should change my invoice, because one cannot switch a phone over and activate it until the account is paid in full (and mine says that I"m behind, when I pay all my bills a month in advance or at the month's beginning online), and, I get hung up on 6 times in a 30 minute period. I kept on calling the customer service, and I kept on getting hung up on.

Sigh. Whatever. Kurt can switch the phone over on his day out.

OK. It's 2:53 here. I'm 2 shots of Beam into the bottle, and I'm really not proud of it. I feel ashamed of myself. The Sprint people drove me to drink. I take full responsibility for my actions.

Mr. Kurt left the house at 12:30 PM for the "big city" of Yelm, 13 miles out, and he arrived at the Nextel/Sprint store at 12:45. He called me at 12:50. He couldn't activate the phone, because the company on the phone said that the phone had a balance of 100 dollars on it, and that it belonged to someone else.

I had to call from my home phone, and I couldn't get through. Meanwhile, Kurt has over 600 miles scheduled today, and he wants to get on the road (he loves to drive, but this is ridiculous). I try again. I get someone with a New Dehli accent (damn you outsourcing) who doesn't understand what I'm trying to say, then she tries to sell me more shit on my phone.

I'm trying to keep my cool; because remember, these people are real people, and it's not their job if they aren't trained well enough, but I'm not doing a good job.

I try to call Kurt at the store, but I can't find the number in the phone book. It's not there. I get online and click on "find a store near you", with our address and zip code. No address comes up in Yelm. Nothing. I want to pull my hair out. I call information. No Nextel store in Yelm. I call Nextel. No store in Yelm.

Yes, there is, and my husband is there!

He calls me back (I couldn't use *69, because he called in during the time I was on hold for Sprint, and those numbers don't come up on your caller ID) and tells me the store's number is under Freedom Phones. Yeah, that makes sense. Why be a Nextel store and put your number in the phone book under cellular? That would be smart.

So, when I talk to him, he says that the people on the customer service line from Sprint now are saying that I still owe 83 dollars. At this point, I went finally nuts. I yelled at poor Kurt. "Give me that fucking phone number!!! I'm going to tear someone's head off!" Whew. Such a temper.

So, I call, get through (cool), and I give the ESN number to the person on the phone (outsourced, but very pleasant and I think afraid of me at this point), and she says that now Kurt can call from the phone and activate it. I call him, and he calls them, and they finally activate the phone.

Incidentally, no one knew what a flash upgrade was. No one. I had to argue with the one rep about it. I had to spell it. F-l-a-s-h. Then, Kurt finds out that all a flash upgrade involves is me telling the rep the ESN number on the phone.

Somewhere around 2:25, I did a shot of Jim Beam. I was so wound up that I didn't know what to do with myself. I had visions of my dead grampa going nuts over stupid things, and I wondered if I had, indeed, lost it over something nuts.

Then, I checked the number of calls I made.

Almost 15 calls that I can add were made to customer service.
6 of them went through that I remember.
2 of the 4 made by Kurt went through.
5 people didn't have record of me paying my bill, which posted in my account on the 4th.
Not one of the reps knew what a flash upgrade was.
Maybe 4 didn't have English as a first language, AND that was during business hours. We are outsourcing during business hours? What the hell?
I was hung up on about 6 times that I remember.
I was told "I don't know" over twenty times.
I was offered to buy an upgrade when, supposedly, I was in the hole 83 dollars, twice.
I dealt with 4 reps (and Kurt dealt with 2) who didn't know to check the first page of my online account and not the last invoice as to the most recent information on my payments.
By the end of the time that I've dealt with these poor, under-educated reps, I knew more collectively than each one of them did.
And, I got to drink while doing so.

Here's the thing. If anyone doesn't know, Sprint and Nextel just merged. I am not stupid. I feel that it must have been hard to combine 2 large companies. Then, I thought to myself, "wait, even the Sprint people didn't know the online information."

This past three days has been nuts. It has been one of the most informative lessons I've ever had on the crazy fiasco that may occur when two companies that may have internal problems of their own don't combine, but collide.

Now, for the scary part.

We started the process of switching the phones three days ago so we wouldn't be caught at the last minute with Kurt on the road with no cell phone. This merger just happened to occur while we needed Sprint. I, as a civilian with no business training, found at least 3 problems that could have been addressed by the companies prior.

1.) Changing the online billing service to reflect the most recent payment to the rep on the phone.
2.) Training the people at Sprint and Nextel before the merger. "Carla", at the Nextel place, specifically told me on the phone that she had no training as to how Sprint works.
3.) Have some sort of blind testing as to the clarity of the outsourced worker. Can you understand just what the fuck this person is mumbling to you?

I just wanted to share my afternoon. I lost my hubby for another 2 months and gained alot of information on the Sprint/Nextel collsion. I also learned alot about myself as far as that I have a boiling point that is alot lower than it used to be.

I think I need to get some Yoga in my life or I need to refind Jesus, because, baby, I have no right blowing my stack over a cell phone.

Anyway, I just wanted to share. Now, is anyone else a Sprint/Nextel user? Curious.


EDIT- you mispell alot when you've had a shot or two....

[Bilgepump]

Yep yep yep...I'd join ya for a bottle or 12,Daph, but I quit drinking 4 years ago. Your story is a duplicate of my horrifying nightmare with Sprint, back on Valentine's day. I purchased 2 phones and a plan,( don't ask me, or Sprint, which one, cuz neither knows) so my sweety could keep a leash on me. This was my first ever cell phone experience, but was I afraid? Intimidated? Totally out of my freaking mind with fear? NOPE!!!
Alas, I should have been....went through much the same as you Daph, and once this godamn contract expires, I'm going back to smoke signals.

[daphne]

I hope the smoke is illegal smoke................................

[General Colon Pow!]

Daph, I can't believe that you (or anyone!) would put up with such crap! I would've told them to shove the phone and everything else up their ass~! (Actually, I did!)

Darn! Is it worth it? (and when ya adds up the bills...these thingies end up costing a few thousand dollars a year)

Every once in a while I say "Geee....I wish I had a cell phone right now"- but much more often, I'm glad that I gave all that up years ago. We lived long enough without such things....we still can. (And the privacy of not having a phone permenantly attached to our ears is a very welcome thing!)

[wonderpance]

damn! don't feel bad daphne. many a person is driven to drink (and perhaps even kill) after having to deal with idiotic sales/support people. i would've done the same thing. except substitute the jim beam for weed, or perhaps a nice, cold can (or five) of PBR.

and i don't think you lost it over a cell phone so much as dealing with idiots, which can be the most frustrating thing in the entire world. i don't think anyone can blame you for going off and then calming down with a drink.

go easy on yourself!

[daphne]

Good point, General. Why DO I put up with this?

EDIT

Because of cell phones. They are erasing the pay phone. Without a calling card, you either need a pay phone or cell.

I hate progress.

[AssBlaster2000]

*cough* T-Mobile *cough*

Well maybe not for you, Daph, because I don't know how much coverage we have in Yelm.

But at least Cingular, because if you want to switch with phones with them or with T-Mobile, all you have to do is take the SIM card (a little memory chip that has all of your customer information on it) out of the phone and put it in the other phone, and you can get it unlocked and take the phone overseas (like Kurt could take it with him if he ever gets deployed overseas) and put a SIM card from that country in it, or you can get another service provider with the same phone.

Sprint's customer service is well known for sucking donkey balls. I get to see all the industry trends and whatnot, and there are the graphs for who has the best and worst customer service based on consumer opinion polls, and Sprint is always the lowest by quite a number of percentage points. I had service with them a few years ago, and I would never go back, because I got fucked up the ass with roaming charges. The industry has changed quite a bit since 2001, but from what I've heard from others the roaming charges are still like ass rape. Outsourcing to India also sucks ass. All of our outsourcers are in the US and Canada.

And "updating the ESN" is so not the same as "doing a flash update." Whatever.

[Di Uhreea]

I'm that crazy lady that will always tell you to NEVER and I mean NEVER sign a 1, 2 or 3 year contract.
Pay & talk baby, all the way.
YOU control your monthly expenditures and you're not stuck with an outdated two-year-old phone after a while.
Costs me about $15/month and I just got a refurbished sweet phone off ebay.com.
Thank YOU!

[wonderpance]

i use T-Mobile! i've never had any problems, and recommend them to everyone.

[AssBlaster2000]

Di - in the US prepaid phones are WAY more expensive than contract phones; if I could get one and pay $15 per month (that is, if I didn't pay $10 per month with my employee plan) then I probably would. Even if you use it for just an emergency and occasional use it is cheaper to get a monthly billed plan. When I had a prepaid phone back in 2000 I was always forgetting to buy the damn cards and I would have to get a new phone number every month.

Wonderpance -- I get a fair amount of callers from Colorado, and for some reason a large number of them are women in their 20's. Now I am always going to wonder if I am talking to you. If I get a caller named something like "Corky" or "Porky" it just might be!

[wonderpance]

hehe...it's possible that we've already talked! i've only had to call customer support once, and it was because of something stupid i did. see, i sent my payment late (i usually pay online, but i didn't this time for some reason i can't remember), but then my service got cut off before they got it. at the time, i couldn't just wait for them to get my payment and reinstate my service for reasons i'm not going to get into because they're not really important. anyway, so then i had to pay by phone to get my service back. so, basically i paid my bill twice, and i called to see what the best course of action was to get my money back. i talked to a very nice lady (ASSBLASTER 2000??) who told me the best way to do it would be to wait until they got my payment and then request a refund, cuz otherwise i would've had to pay fines to my bank and probably T-Mobile for stopping payment on the check. i ended up just leaving it and having my bill paid a couple months in advance.

sound familiar??

[AssBlaster2000]

I used to do billing, but not anymore. (Thank goodness!) So it's possible . . . that sounds like advice I might have given someone, but I talk to 1000 people per month so it's hard to say. If you talked to a rep whose name was also the name of a flower between the hours of 4:30 pm and 1 am Eastern time on a day between Sunday and Thursday, that increases the likelihood.

Now that I am tech support I frequently get the same customer twice, because there are thousands upon thousands of reps who do billing, but only a few hundred who do tech. Sometimes I can't finish with a person because they're talking on their phone and they have to powercycle it (a fancy term for turning it off and then turning it back on again) or something like that to test the results of what I do, or their battery goes dead and I'm unable to call them back, and I get them right back after they've done what they had to do. It's weird when that happens. I still have to ask them for their account info and stuff, because I'll get in trouble if I don't, but I already know them. One time I got the same dude two days in a row for completely unrelated issues, and he was flirting with me like mad because he thought we had some kind of connection or something, which is funny, because he was some dude from the Midwest and I'm a married woman from Pennsylvania. Some dudes really need to get laid.

[Bilgepump]

In my single days, I had days long conversations with my toaster, hoping to get laid.

[AssBlaster2000]

Dude, be careful with toasters. You'll get burned if you don't watch out. You might have better luck with vacuum cleaners. They're always up for a little sucky-sucky.

[wonderpance]

hmmm....damn, i can't remember if i called when i was on my lunch break, or later after i got off work. i also can't remember the name of the person i talked to, cuz i'm horrible about that. oh well, i guess we'll never know.

but, if i ever have to call for tech support, i'll pay attention to who i'm talking to!