I’m furious.
Remember last month’s epic Sprint customer service fail when it took me three hours to purchase my Blackberry?
Well, this morning Madre Jansen sent me an email:
Madre Jansen: “What is this $30 equipment charge on the phone bill? Here is the username and password for the account. Figure it out.”
So I call sprint:
Sprint Rep: “Hi stranger. What’s the 10-digit pin for the account?”
Me: “Erm… I have a password and username.”
Sprint Rep: “Credentials fail. That’s only for online.”
So I hang up, call mom for the pin, and call Sprint again:
Me: “Here is the pin…”
Sprint Rep #2: “Great. Did you call us recently?”
Me: “Yeah, like two minutes ago. I had to get the pin from a parent.”
Sprint Rep: “Okay Shady. So, because you just called I have to have my manager listening in and….”
Me: “Okay. I have a $30 ‘equipment charge’ on my bill, and I would like to know what it is for.”
Sprint Rep: “Yes. You do have an equipment charge. It’s for equipment!”
Me: “…how helpful. But what does that mean? What is the charge for? What equipment?”
Sprint Rep: “I dunno. You bought something at a store. I just have a sku number. It’s a mystery!”
Me: “…well, would the store know?”
Sprint Rep: “Hm. Maybe. Where is the store? What’s your zip? Let me call them. Hold. […] They said you bought a Blackberry and a charger. It might have been for a charger!”
Me: “Hm. I bought a car charger, but I guarantee it wasn’t a flat $30… and I paid for it with a credit card.”
Sprint Rep: “We are only showing one charge on your mastercard.”
Me: “I don’t think I put it on my mastercard. That was just for the blackberry. Hm.”
Sprint Rep: “Check your bank statements. I dunno…”
Me: “I think the Sprint rep was going to give me a $30 credit for it taking three hours to buy my phone.”
Sprint Rep: “Hm maybe. Call us back when you figure that out. Peace!”
I pull up my bank statements online. The car charger was on my Visa. The blackberry was on the mastercard. Sprint was full of crap, and the $30 charge was still a mystery.
I call Sprint back.
Sprint Rep #3: “Yes, we see that you have a $30 charge. Let me look into that. Hold.”
Me: “… ”
Sprint Rep: Yes. It looks like your blackberry was $291.51 and you only paid $261.51 with your mastercard. That’s why your account was charged.”
Me: “I’m pretty sure the $30 was the “pain in the ass/incompetence” credit the store rep. offered me for waiting 3 hours at the store.”
Sprint Rep: “Oh, well let me contact that store. Hold. […] it seems like Hank, the rep that helped you, is not in today. The store will call me back tomorrow and I’ll follow up with you and we’ll get this resolved.”
Me: “We have to wait for him to go into work?”
Sprint Rep: “Yes.”
Me: “This is frustrating. The point of the $30 credit was to compensate me for his bad customer service that caused me to be in the store for 3 hours and now I’ve wasted 30 minutes dealing with this.”
Sprint Rep: “Sorry that you’ve spent thirteen minutes on the phone. I’m going above and beyond here because normally you would have to deal with the store.”
Me: “Oh, I’d love to give them a piece of my mind. And I’ve only been on the phone with you for 13 minutes but you’re the third person I’ve talked to today. I’m taking this pain in the ass in aggregate. I just feel further inconvenienced by the store’s incompetence and I’m frustrated that I have to wait to get this resolved. Whine-bitch-moan, boom-shaka-laka, laka boom.”
I was seething by the end of the call, and then called Madre Jansen:
Mom: “So grasshopper, how’d it go?”
Me: “BAH!! Next time I need something from a Sprint store, I’m going to Wisconsin.”
Note: the conversation is obviously condensed and paraphrased. The point is, that I’m only a Sprint customer because of my parent’s longstanding relationship to the company…otherwise I’d already be with AT&T.
18 Comments
Joe Mason
October 10, 2010 at 12:21 pmcustomer service should be put first with any kind of business”‘*
Pixy
February 10, 2011 at 12:13 pm*sigh* I feel your pain…going through something VERY similar right now with Sprint!
vvinkvvink
September 22, 2011 at 7:41 amMy conversation with sprint :
Me: I got charged an additional $25 on my bill what’s going on?
sprint: oh, you just got a new smart phone and we make people pay $10/ month for data.
Me: oh, why wasn’t I explained this when I purchased the phone? I ordered over the phone with a sprint representative and I explained to her although I have a credit for $150 in the system but I just wanted a free phone and I want my bill to remain the same.
Sprint: well it is what it is.
Me: may I speak to your supervisor?
Supervisor: Sorry I can give you a revolving credit every month for $5 so you’ll only pay $5 but I can’t take the whole fee out.
Me: ok
Supervisor: it won’t take into effect until two bill cycles so this month you have to pay that amount.
Me: ok
Two months later…. Still no credit
Called back and had the same conversation.
Supervisor #2 : ok it won’t take into effect for two billing cycles
Me: that’s what the other representative told me and I had to pay a high amount on my bill I don’t want to keep paying that high
Supervisor #2: there’s nothing I can do you’ll have to wait and see but I did put it in the system
Another two months goes by…. Still no credit!!!!
I called them again and explained my situation.
Supervisor #3: I’m not going to give you a $5 credit.
Me: why? Your previous supervisors said ok.
Jansen
October 1, 2011 at 12:00 pmI would get their name and employee number next time.
vvinkvvink
September 22, 2011 at 7:46 amSupervisor #3: Im not going to credit you anything
Me: what else can we do cause I waited almost four months thinkin we resolved it but you guys won’t do your part and just keep making me pay extra $25 when you guys said it was only $10 why is it ok for you guys to lie? Do I need to cancel your service? I’ve been with you guys 12 years.
Supervisor #3: stop repeating yourself. I don’t care. Dont front cancel us if you want. (his exact words)
I hate sprint they have the worst people working for them. I will definitely go to another company as soon as this contract is over!
Jansen
October 1, 2011 at 11:59 amOh my goodness!
Rabbitzan
November 20, 2011 at 8:17 amWow I’m glad I did not think I would find this many who was as upset if not more so with sprint than I am.
So here is my issue with sprint or at least the latest and greatest issue. 9 months ago when I was getting ready to deploy I told them to put my bill on military suspesion and was sur ethat they had before I was finally done talking to them. When I returned home from over seas I thout I was going to be able to restablish my plan as was teh case with my previous deployment. When I called however they told me that the plan had not been ended and actually was “cancelled prematurely” due to the bill not being paid. I needed a phone that night so I had to pay off over $500 in charges to my canceled plan to get a new one and to make matters worse they did not even plan to give me a plan that night they were going to make to make me wait 24 hours to get my prexisting phone on a new plan. I was seriously hacked. My NCO took my phone and straightened out that Customer Service rep real quick and was brought up thier service chain by at least 5 steps before the issue was resolved. Now I’m paying money I can’t afford on a plan I don’t want and don’t need but at least I have a phone. Yea, I’m switching services to Verizon.
old plan: Unlimited text, unlimited minutes (I use around 1000 minutes a month)
New plan: Unlimited text, unlimited data (I use no data still use over 1000 minutes in less than a month because it’s part of my job.)
So do I hate sprint? The answer is yes I do.
Rabbitzan
November 20, 2011 at 8:20 amMy phone as in the one I had to completly open for the serial number and the phone I was useing which was his at the time to fix the issue.
mandi
April 29, 2012 at 6:49 amnot all sprint reps. are rude. I am a sprint customer service representative and I apologize you guys have had so many problems with us. If the supervisors were to find out they had talked so demeening and rude, they would either have lost there job or had been written up. sprint charges the 10 dollor data fee so your smartphones can get interent. The good news is there is no cap to it, where as other companies may slow you down at a certain point, we do not. it should have been told to you in the store when you purchased your phone. I would have been aggrivated as welll.
mandi
April 29, 2012 at 6:50 amat this time, we are not allowed to ever give out our employee id number under any circumstance. The best thing to do is demand a supervisor next time.
Kristy
April 30, 2012 at 5:21 pmI feel your pain, all of you. I requested my account be closed six months ago, and Sprint has it documented on my account, but guess what? IT’S STILL OPEN!!!! My account was sent to collections in February, I paid the collections agency, and then called Sprint to find out my request was never honored. (I got another phone so let my old one die and never even though to check it as I was told the service would be cancelled). I went through a million people, supervisors included, and had to retell my story to everyone. They all agreed Sprint was in the wrong and told me my money would be refunded. Well, two months later, no money, so I call again and guess what, STILL OPEN!!! The money they were going to refund me had been applied to my bill as a credit, and they had been using that money to pay my bill the last two months…wtf!?! The last supervisor I talked too said she needed 48 hours to look over the issue. I have never in my life been so frustrated with a company. I used to work in a call center, so I know it sucks to have people yell at you, and all the people I’ve talked to have been nice…just inept at their job. I just want my account closed and my money refunded, is that so difficult? NEVER will I do business with Sprint again.
David
May 28, 2012 at 9:28 pmHad a Sprint phone with a roommate. I moved, left him the phone with instructions to either switch it into his name or turn it off. He took me literally and just turned the phone off and put it in a box. A few years later I tried to get a new Sprint phone. After I sent them money they sent me an email telling me my order was cancelled. They had decided that I had a delinquent account and would not give me a new one until the old one was payed off AND a new $199 deposit payed.
So, I told them to send my money back to me and send me a copy of the past due bill and I would review it. They said that they had sent it to collections so they no longer had those records. I asked how they could prove that I owed them money if they no longer had my records. They said that that was just the way it was. I went around and around with several different people, only one would admit to even finding record of my money, let alone trying to be helpful. One woman, not even in collections or billing told me that if I simply paid my bills on time they would not treat me like a bad person. I asked for her name and info and she hung up. Another guy told me that it was their intention to pay my bill with the money and then return the rest, and still deny me service. I told him that since it was an Electronic Funds Transfer with a specific purpose it was illegal for them to apply that money to another purpose without my permission. He laughed and told me to sue them.
I ended up sic-ing the state Attorney General on them and got my money back. Never paid the bill since they refused to provide me with a copy. Follow up was that after seven years when it was no longer even on my credit report I started getting letters from some random collection agency offering to settle the debt at a discount. I threw those letters out and never looked back.
Ellie
October 13, 2012 at 1:44 amI HATE SPRINT!!! Their customer service representatives are SO RUDE and the so called managers! They charged me $100 on my bill for something. One representative said one thing and the other said that person was wrong. So I was on the phone for 1 1/2 hours they didn’t want to help and they were yelling at me. They are so rude can’t do their job and never heard of the customer is always right!
william
December 4, 2012 at 10:25 pmWorst company to deal with period. Worst wireless service only topped by worst company phone operators. Extremly difficult cancel service even after contract is up. I truly think they are trained this way.
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