My Paul Harvey Moment

brian — Mon, 05 May 2008 17:49:34 +0000

If you haven’t already, read the item below about my decision to get rid of my traditional cell phone for a pre-paid phone in an attempt so save money. Go ahead, I’ll wait.

*whistles*

OK, now, as Paul Harvey used to say, here’s the “rest of the story.”

When I first got my new phone, I had little trouble transferring the number to my new phone. Of all the things associated with this decision, that worried me most since I use the phone for personal and work stuff. I didn’t need a hiccup with this to get me in trouble at work.

After that happened, I went to activate the new phone. I had a little trouble at first and needed to call customer service. They had me put in some codes, and the phone started working fine. I was slightly annoyed I couldn’t do it online, but it didn’t bother me that much.

The service came with 10 free minutes, but I had bought a card for 400 minutes. All the advertisements said adding minutes was a snap. You could do it either through thephone or online. Piece of cake, I thought. Until I tried.

It didn’t work through the phone or online. I tried probably a half-dozen times. I finally gave up and called in on Friday. The customer service people said there was a problem with my phone and passed me on to a higher level of customer service. To be honest, this was like one drunk person passing the phone to another person at the bar.

They couldn’t help me for shit and told me it would take at least 24 hours to fix the problem. I was pissed and let them know it, even though I managed not to swear at all. I know they are offshore people making pennies per minute, but the last person claimed to have no supervisor and couldn’t do anything to help me except to put in a ticket.

I stewed for a while, then got a different phone number from a friend who Googled some stuff on the company. That didn’t work because I ended up in the same circles of Hell. I again went round and round about why there was no supervisor, which just boggled my mind. And they had the most outstanding logic for why they couldn’t help me.

CSR: There is a problem with your account

Me: What is the problem?

CSR: We can’t open your account

Me: Why can’t you open it?

CSR: Because there is a problem with your account

Me: What is the problem?

CSR: We can’t open your account

Lather, rinse, repeat

I wasted probably 45 minutes on the two phone calls and wanted to go through the roof. I had only eight minutes left headed into the weekend. At some point, one of the CSR’s intimated that the 24 hours for resolution might not start until Monday because that department didn’t work on weekends. I almost blew up.

This is where the Interwebs came to my rescue. I found the e-mail for the VP of Sales and marketing and sent him a note about all my problems. In less than 10 minutes, he sent an e-mail (he CC’d me) to someone else to “fix this.” That was the whole message.

One guy called on my way home from work Friday. It was 5:30 and I had 40 minutes left in my commute. I needed to be on a different line to input the codes, and his department closed at 6. He was very apologetic, like a guy who was told to take care of the problem or face some serious shit.

Someone else called on Saturday and got me my minutes within 10 minutes. She also said they would automatically double the number of minutes for my next purchase of airtime. A couple of hours later, someone from corporate headquarters called and gave me 500 free minutes.

So I have 1,000 minutes thanks to some shitty customer service people and my desire to not be screwed over royally. Hopefully, I can make them last for a while.

Getting Free Stuff – Regular Guy

My Paul Harvey Moment