Cingular Wireless

Cingular Wireless LLC

An open letter to them. This was sent to Cingular by me. The addresses are all public information available on Hoovers.com. I would appreciate it being posted as both a complaint and a resource for people wishing to complain. Thank you.

To:

Cingular Wireless LLC

Glenridge Highlands Two 5565

Genridge Connector, Atlanta, GA., 30342

CC: Chairman Rayford Wilkins

President/CEO Stanley Stigman

COO Ralph de la Viga

AT&T Inc.

175 E. Houston

San Antonio, TX., 78205

CC: Chairman/ CEO Edward E. Whiteacre Jr.

SEVP, Bus. Dev. James W. Callaway

COO/ Director Randall L. Stephenson

Bell South Corp.

1155 Peachtree St. NE

Atlanta, GA., 30309

CC: Chairman/ President/ CEO F. Duane Ackerman

President/ COO/ Director Mark L. Fedler

CFO W. Patrick Shannon

Dear Sirs:

I would like to inform you of my experience with Cingular Wireless. First, a little background on my account. I am a former AT&T Wireless subscriber. I have been with the service for over 10 years. When I first signed up, my AT&T service was flawless. I could receive and make call from any location, never had a single dropped call, and always received superior customer service. At the time, I recommended AT&T service to everyone I knew. My parents and entire family signed up for it based on what a great experience I had. I have two accounts with you, one a GSM, and one a TDMA (which happens to be the only phone that always works right).

Then, Cingular Wireless purchased the service. It has never been the same since.

Since that fateful day, sometime back in 2004, when by my poor luck Cingular acquired AT&T, I have had at least one dropped call per day, generally more like 4 or 5. I have experienced being unable to get service in my own house, particularly on my GSM phone. The speech quality is poor. I’ve experienced at least 2 occasions when I had an emergency and suddenly Cingular’s service was down and I was unable to make calls for home. Luckily, no one died. I’ve made call after call to Cingular and I always get the same run around- the service is being worked on, blah, blah, blah. I happen to know, since I am a part of it, that there is a class action lawsuit against your company for just such dropped calls and unavailable service. More bars in more places my ass. I can’t even get two bars in my bathroom. I could probably wrap my phone in tinfoil to get better reception. This happens on both the TDMA and GSM phone, by the way, with the GSM phone being by far the worst – everyone I know with your GSM service has said it’s horrible. The TDMA one is the only reliable one, which brings me to my next point.

A brand new $4.99 charge every month for having a TDMA/ Analog phone. Penalizing customers with old phones using the “old”service, when 80% of the country still has analog.

I don’t make millions of dollars as the CEO of a company with stock options. I can’t afford to upgrade my phone. No one has ever offered me a “free” phone with a service upgrade (which of course, would be far less minutes for far more money, since I only pay $29.99 on one phone now and get 800 minutes under my contract). I can’t even afford to upgrade my service. I don’t make much money. But yet, I’ve stuck with Cingular, even through all the problems, and transitions, and never once considered going to another company.

Until now.

I saw the $4.99 charge on the bill I just received in the mail. I called customer service to ask about it. I was told it was on my July bill. Well, I certainly never saw any notification on my July bill, and I would think that it would have been sent separately in order to ensure that people did not overlook the so-called “notification”. Honestly, I wouldn’t even be writing to you right now if your customer service department had done one simple thing. Credit the $4.99 for this month to give me a chance to either look for an affordable upgrade or to cancel my service. However, they did nothing.

The only thing I got was a bunch of runaround and a “we can’t do anything about it”. I’m sorry but that is BS. How much does it take to get a $4.99 credit? I got a $10 credit, TWICE, simply because my voicemail went down, and I didn’t even ask for it. I asked to speak with a supervisor this time, whom I had to ask for 3 TIMES before the rep would give me one, and I got the same rhetoric of “we can’t do anything”. I said “you mean to tell me that you can’t give me a $4.99 credit for a charge I never received notice of, when I have TWO ACCOUNTS with you that I spend almost $100 per month on, have been with you for almost 10 years, and my whole family is on Cingular? You can’t give me a simple credit on one phone for one month based on the fact that you are going to lose a customer if you don’t?”

They said “NO”.

I have to tell you, based on that no, you have now lost an entire family of customers. I am distressed and upset. I had more faith in Cingular than that. I thought that once AT&T took back controlling interest, problems would no longer be common.

I was wrong.

I am currently in the process of looking for new service. Within the next two weeks, unless I receive that simple $4.99 credit from Cingular, I will be canceling service on both phones. I really don’t think a $4.99 credit is too much to ask for simple one month period. I will also be posting this letter to the Better Business Bureau as well as several websites that deal with consumer complaints. I will also pass a copy along to the group that is heading the class action lawsuit, as I am sure they would be interested to know how shoddily longtime customers are being treated by the wireless service “with the fewest dropped calls”. Fewest dropped calls- ha! Unless you own the “independent” market research company that did the surveys, I have no idea where you got your information. Consumer Reports even rated Cingular the worst of the major cell carriers, TWICE- two years in a row. It’s a sad day when a once proud phone giant reels in new customers through advertising lies, and exiles old ones by forcing them to pay for new services that don’t work or be penalized for trying to stick with old ones that do.

Sign me,

A new Verizon Wireless / T-Mobile/ Sprint Customer

Justine Burgess