AT&T & DirectTV, you’re on notice.
I’m SICK to death of companies like you that jack up prices out of nowhere and literally “trick” your customers into other products and/or services and then are COMPLETELY UNABLE to provide even the most basic customer service in return when there’s an issue.
And on SOME days, like today, when YOU actually mess up and make a mistake, it takes someone THREE HOURS and EIGHT PHONE CALLS to you to get it “straightened out”.
I contacted AT&T (where our bill for both our internet service and DirectTV is combined – at THEIR insistence to “make things easier”) last Friday to make payment arrangements on my bill as I was not going to be able to make the due date this month. I spent an actual nice 15 minutes on the phone that day with their Billing/Accounts Receivable office to make the arrangements, which were done right away, and within moments of hanging up, I received the confirmation of the payment arrangement. I was also promised on the phone call that there would be no interruption of services since an arrangement was made.
Lo & Behold – we get to today – two full days before the first arrangement payment was to be made (this Friday, 7/7) to wake up to find the services were off. I held my cool, and started my 1st of EIGHT phone calls at noon.
It didn’t start well. The billing supervisor said that they showed my phone call but that I was told the service arrangements couldn’t be met. I said that was impossible as I had a confirmation email from them stating that YES it was fine, with the outlined arrangements confirmed BY AT&T. In writing. Of course, they have no email to forward this to for any contact or pr0of on my end. No “customerservice@att.com” or anything along those lines.
Once I got her to understand that this had already been approved and was in place, she sent yet another arrangement, now at a higher amount, to my email address, and assured me that services would be restored shortly.
Our internet was back on rather quickly. However, within a half hour of that the television services (satellite) still had not come back up. I called and was told that DirectTV could take a little longer, but that it would be on shortly.
I waited ANOTHER hour & 1/2, and the services still were not on. I began calling again, and was transferred to Technical Support, Customer Loyalty, some department called ISM (no idea what that stands for), got dropped off a call on one transfer, called back and EACH and EVERY time I was transferred or talked to a “new” person, I had to explain THE ENTIRE SITUATION back over again from the start.
After 3 hours of phone calls, I FINALLY got to someone in a Technical Support department who, after 30 minutes, was able to get things rolling… needless to say I was less than pleasant by this time and even though I apologized for sounding “gruff” I am mortified to find:
- AT&T does own DirectTV, but their accounting systems don’t communicate with each other. I don’t care.
- AT&T said our best bet was to combine the bill several months ago, which has been nothing but confusion and wrong information.
- When you call AT&T about “your bill” they do NOT inform DirectTV of anything said or agreed upon. You are expected to call DirectTV SEPERATELY to re-discuss what AT&T promises you. That’s absolutely BULLSHIT.
- We were coerced into getting DirectTV a little less than 2 years ago by AT&T service personnel after having U-Verse for about 7 years. The other main reason of doing this was because the cable service kept going out after a few months, resulting in multiple service calls, modem replacements and even more “excuses” as to why the service had failed – most of the time the service technician just blamed the previous technician…. we got used to hearing that.
- After a brief “honeymoon” period of some discounted prices, the cost of DIRECT TV is more than 1/3 higher than we were paying for U-Verse, despite being told this would NOT BE THE CASE. Basically, we were lied to and coerced into a service that can’t stay on during storms (Oh no, satellite technology has advanced – this should not be a problem, we were told) and is far inferior to what we had with U-Verse, of course also owned by AT&T.
I don’t care what the reason…. NO COMPANY should subject their customers into three hours of phone calls and wasted time. I’m now going to send them a bill for my time at the rate of $125 per hour for today’s waste, error, and interruption to MY day.
We’re also going to switch internet providers to a faster and less expensive service as well as seriously look into the use of streaming/ala carte services like Sling and/or Hulu Live. The cost of the services through AT&T/DirectTV, where they CLEARLY do not appreciate or have any consideration for customer that have been in their service for one product or more at a time for the last EIGHT years.
This is an internet “up yours”, AT&T/DirectTV. You plain SUCK and you’re not getting any more of 0ur money. Your customer service representatives are poorly trained, prone to rudeness, and have not got a CLUE how to truly service your customers. It’s now obvious that you don’t even honor your own promises as witnessed by our agreement last week and still discontinuing your honor or word, nor admitting your mistake.
The Worst.
#attsucks
#directtvsucks
#attscam #directtvscam
#atttheives #directtv
#attcustomerservice #directtvcustomerservice
#betterbusinessbureau #texasstateattorney
#consumerprotectionagency
Consider yourself on notice.