T-Mobile Customer Service Fail

Welcome back!

For a whole host of reasons that you do not care to hear (the failings of the post office and banks among them), my bill payment to T-Mobile was one day late, this month. Although this formed the impetus of my story, it bears little significance to the overall point.

First, T-Mobile sent me a polite “reminder” text on a Saturday that I needed to pay my bill. Having already paid the bill, electronically, I ignored the message. Besides, it was SATURDAY, what could I do?

Well, first thing Monday morning (by chance (ha!), the date of the delivery of my electronic payment), T-Mobile shuts off my phone! Not even half a business day after my “reminder.”

Here’s where things get interesting. I call to “inform” T-Mobile about the payment, with the fully processed, electronic payment confirmation in hand and the computer voice on the other end of the phone says, “Until you make a payment, I cannot forward your call to a representative.” WHAT?! I cannot speak to a real person? What kind of customer service is this? Are you kidding me?

I finally got to a real person through the back-door method of not entering my phone number and just hitting “0,” immediately. Of course, they were not able to resolve the issue, but this really isn’t the point. I was still astounded by this unbelievable lack of customer service that I was not able to actually speak about a problem regarding my account with a real person!

In an age when the CEO of Sprint gives out his personal email (even if it is a gimmick, it’s a good one), anyone can start a blog in a day, register a complaint with any number of sites, portable cell numbers, and forums everywhere, how can a major company get away with treating customers this way?

Finally, I get my second bill this week and it does not reflect the payment, even though it was printed well after the payment posted and they turned my phone back on.

The whole experience has been absolutely stunning.  I wonder, if I’d known this to be the case before buying the phones and service from T-Mobile, if I’d still gone ahead with the deal?  Probably.  In my humble opinion, all cell phone service providers suck. Some just suck worse than others and I strive to get the least amount of suck for the least amount of money. Therefore, I expect to take some bad with a little bit of good.  However, not being able to speak with an actual person?  Is this too much bad to be balanced out by the good?  What are your thoughts?

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