AT&T Doesn't Need Your Business

I am a single mother and I work full-time. I am also a full-time student, and because of my first two "jobs" I am only able to take classes online in my own home, after my two year old has gone to sleep or while he is otherwise engaged.

In June of this year I obtained wireless Internet service with a local company, and was able to take my summer courses without incident. However, on August 21st I was sent a letter from this company informing me that my internet service would no longer be available on August 24th (which also happened to be the first day of my fall semester classes) because the water tower from which the internet signal was transmitted was scheduled to be torn down and relocated, and they would send a technician to my home to see if service would be available from the new tower location. The same day the letter was sent, my Internet was unavailable. The following day, Saturday August 22, I called AT&T at the suggestion of a neighbor, in an attempt to set up DSL Internet. My neighbor had told me that since we live in such a rural area, they had been told that DSL service was unavailable by AT&T, and it was only after they had stopped and spoke with an AT&T technician that they were told that service was indeed available, and they had no problem setting up their internet service after they went to a local dealer and warned them of their rural location and previous difficulties. When I was connected to a sales representative that day, I explained that I needed the Internet as soon as possible because my classes would be starting on the 24th and I told them about the issue my neighbor had faced when trying to get their service. The agent told me that he was unable to find my location in his computer system, and that he would need to contact AT&T employees that would not be in the office until Monday, to find my address and set up service. He promised that he would call me at work Monday at 11:00 A.M. I waited and never received a call back... I called the customer service line a couple of days later and was told by a different representative that service was not available in my area.

So I decided to take the advice of the local technician and speak with a local AT&T dealer. The following week, Tuesday September 1st, I went to PCA wireless, an AT&T authorized dealer, in Marion (where I work) on my lunch break. I told Andy the manager (perhaps owner) of the store what I done to try and get the service. He tried to set up my service himself, and ran into the same problem of not being able to find my address. I told him that my neighbor had the service and had been through a similar problem. He said he would have to request that technician go to my home and test the speeds that would be available to me, and that this may take a couple of days, and he would call me with the results. After two days had passed and I hadn't heard anything, I called the AT&T customer service line to inquire about the progress. The representative told me that the request was in the system but it had not been done yet but it could take up to 72 hours and if I hadn't heard anything by the following day to go back to PCA wireless and ask about it again. So, Friday the 4th I went back to PCA wireless on my lunch break. There was a different worker in there (Corey Thompson) he explained that Andy was a funeral, and he was there to cover the store for him. I told him my entire situation, he looked up the my account and said he'd have to call the technician to find out whether or not they had been to check out my house, and he would call me at work as soon as he found out. He made good on his promise and called me around two that afternoon and told me that I couldn't get enough speed for DSL because I was too far away from some sort of switch.

None of this made any sense to me since my neighbor is able to get the service, and I was getting very frustrated because I was into my second week of classes and still didn't have the Internet. I still have a strong belief that no technician ever came to do the testing. Corey suggested that I try out a wireless Internet card. He told me that the speed would be as good as Broadband Internet, I would be able to take my laptop anywhere and get online, and that the prices were very similar. I arranged to go back into PCA wireless after work that evening to set up the service. When I got there, I asked many questions about the service, and made him repeat several of the guarantees that he had made over the phone. I told him I was concerned about getting the card home, and not being able to get a good quality signal. I asked him if there was a trial period for me to decide if the service would work for me. He told me that out of all of them that he's sold he's never had one returned, that he was certain that there was not going to be a problem, but if there was, I would have a three day period to return the card "WITH NO CHARGE OR PENALTY". I did some quick math and figured out that my third day would be on Labor Day. I specifically asked, if I didn't decide by the following afternoon, would I be screwed since they would be closed on Sunday and Labor Day, and he said "WE WILL BE OPEN ON LABOR DAY". I was reluctant to sign the two-year contract, which was illegible because it had been faxed in because of a printer malfunction, but after all of Corey's reassurances of a no-penalty trial combined with the mounting pressures from the growing crowd in the store to wrap up my business with the sole employee that day, I signed the contract.

I didn't have much time to mess with the card until Sunday. My signal was very weak and I kept getting disconnected. Since I take exams and quizzes online that cannot be reset (online professors are incredibly unforgiving of technical difficulties) I decided that the card had to be returned, and I would just have to find a different service. Monday afternoon, I left a family gathering, and drove all the way back into Marion (more than a half hour both way), got there around 3 and discovered, to my intense disgust, that I had wasted even more of my limited time and incredibly limited money to drive there and find a CLOSED SIGN ON THE DOOR!!! Able to do nothing more, I went back to join my family and try to enjoy the holiday.

At ten o'clock that evening, my son began having trouble breathing, and I had to take him to the Emergency Room. He was admitted for treatment and observation, and I had to take the following day off of work to stay with him in the hospital. Despite all of my desires to remain by his side, I left him alone in the hospital to return the laptop card. I got to PCA Wireless, and Andy was back. I told him that Corey had called to find out about the availability and that I couldn't get DSL, and that he had sold me the wireless card. He asked if I got signal at all or if it just wasn't as fast as I wanted it. I told him that it would connect but it was slower than dial-up Internet and even that was intermittent. I told him that Corey assured me that I would have no problem and it would be as fast as Broadband. Andy explained that Corey was a salesperson from Indianapolis where there is a 3G network, and that in our area, we do not have 3G coverage so we would never have a fast signal. I told him that the service was not going to meet my needs, and he began to process the return.

I told him that I had taken the time away from family yesterday and drove to the store to find the store closed. He said that they had been open until 2, and that he would have to charge me the activation fee. At this, I burst into tears of frustration and anger. I put my foot down and said that I was told that they would be open on Labor Day, normal business hours are until 6pm. I was not told that they would be open for shortened hours, and that I had wasted my time and money, yet again because of this information. If I had been told that they would be open until two, of course I would have been there before two, but I was lied to once again. Andy said the best thing he could do would be to indicate on my account that I had been there on the third day to return my product, but the store was closed, and suggest that I should not be charged the activation fee.

Since he said this was all he could do, I said okay. He told me that I could expect a check for around $90.00 to arrive in the mail in ten days. I told him that I had paid more than that, and he pointed to a sign that was mostly hidden behind a phone display and the register that said, "There will be a $25 restocking fee for all returns." This brought on another wave of tears and I told him that I was never informed of this charge and that Corey had promised that I wouldn't incur any fees so long as I returned it in the three day period. Andy reiterated that Corey was just filling in and that he probably forgot to mention it. At that time I wanted roll-over and die. I’ve never felt so taken advantage of, misinformed, and Andy made it quite clear that there was nothing I could do about it but roll over and accept his "generous" offer to try and refund my activation fee. I walked out of that store bawling, and made the resolution never again to do business with a company who would treat a person worse than dirt.

I'd been waiting quite patiently for my refund check in the mail, I received a monthly bill, which I disregarded as an error since I had cancelled my service before I could have possibly racked up any charges. I let more than three weeks pass before I called the AT&T customer service line to inquire about my refund. The agent I was connected to looked up my account and gave me some long line of excuses and explanations why I had not yet received my check, but said that the system said that my refund would be coming with the next bill. Puzzled, I asked "So my next bill will contain a check for my refund?", to which the agent quickly assured me was true. Before we got off the phone she even went a step further and promised me that I would have my check by October 12th.

Today is October 13th. I opened my mailbox to find a letter from AT&T. I couldn't even wait to get into my house to open the envelope. I was overjoyed at the thought of finally being done with AT&T and recovering a small amount of the money that they have taken from me. I tore open the letter to find a bill, telling me that I need to pay them $11.01.

That was my breaking point. Rather than call their customer service line, and be told more lies, wait more time, and let them take advantage of me, I got on the AT&T website to search for a place to file a complaint. I searched their entire site, I tried to send them an email, but when I typed in my account number it said that I could no longer email because my account was closed. The only method of complaining is over their customer service line. I'd call, but I want all of my experiences documented. I found a page on their site about their outstanding customer service policies. How no company does more to ensure customer satisfaction. How AT&T understands that customer satisfaction is their livelihood. How it's their policy to ensure that everything is made crystal clear the to customer before the sale, and how there are no surprises. Even the website is telling me lies and giving me the "run around".

So I'm going to do everything I can to make sure that AT&T rectifies my situation, and doesn't do it to more people in the future. I'm a reasonable and understanding person, but they have cost me much more than the check that I sent. They cost me time. They caused me distress. They caused me to miss quizzes for my classes while I was waiting on them to do business with me. AT&T is such a big company that they don't care how poorly they treat customers, because at the end of the day they'll still be making millions.

Please help me make this right. Stop them from continuing the constant deception and thievery. Don't bother with AT&T because trust me, they won't bother to do anything for you!