Cingular Wireless - quoted plan with additional minute charge of $ .39 - billed $ .45 per minute for extra minutes - poor service experience

Complaints.com received the following consumer message on February 26, 2003:

From: Valarie Mabry [Email User]

RE: Cingular Wireless - quoted plan with additional minute charge of $ .39 - billed $ .45 per minute for extra minutes - poor service experience I would like to submit a complaint about Cingular wireless. I have had service with them for about 1 year with no problems. Then I ordered a new plan in December, I ordered the 1000-minute plan for 49.99 and added 2 additional phones for a family plan. The plan calls for .39 a min after the 1000 minutes and the company that I am a VP for pays the bill. We were looking at adding a bunch of additional business phones when I turned in my bill to the company I realized that I was being charged .45/min.

I called Cingular and reported the discrepancy and they informed me that the package I had ordered was not available until about 4 days after I had signed up and basically called me a liar. Since I have nothing to gain by this as my company pays my whole cell phone as a perk of employment I was offended by this and it became more about them owning up for the error.

Had they said “ I’m sorry but the representative you signed up with set you up for a plan that was not available to start yet” I would have at least understood and been fine, but to accuse me of lying was about as bad customer service as you can get.

I became upset and cancelled my service for which they informed me that they will be charging me 150.00 for each phone. Cingular lost out on any chance to pick up our companies business which is about 25 phones and I will never do business with a company that promotes a plan and then bills you for another and then doesn’t do anything other than say your lying. Greg Eidschun