TMobile, you have left me no choice other than to “take to the airwaves” with this. The information below will be factual and possibly peppered with a few slants toward my irritation, but after more than 60 days of “fighting” about this issue, I’m simply done.
I will preface this with the FACT that we’ve been customers of yours for over 15 years, and during that time have paid you roughly $32,000 for the use of your services and phones, including cell phones and tablets and data. The equivalent of a car in price.
The two phone lines on our family account participate in your “JUMP’ program and have from the start, back when you had to wait 6 months in between phone upgrades. We often will jump to the newest phones available now and have for the past few years. Usually both lines at the same time. Most jumps have been done in the store but a few have been done online.
ISSUE #1
Around October of 2016 we jumped both lines to the newest phone we liked, the LG V20 and completed the jump paperwork online, contracts and all as well as the taxes required for the phone purchases. We received the new phones (in separate packages, of course) and sent the old phones *(Galaxy Edge 7’s) back to the provided address using the labels supplied in the packaging, and they were dropped in the USPS outgoing chute personally – an enclosed drop – INSIDE the post office in Pflugerville, TX. Phones were well protected inside, wrapped internally with several layers of bubble wrap and undamaged.
Later in November after we’d set up the new phones and were using them, I received an email stating that the offer had been rescinded for one of the lines due to a cracked screen, and that the numbers on the phone were “incorrect”, and I had the option of accepting that or having the phone sent back to me. I opted to have the phone sent back to me and intended to go up to the store, which we did upon receipt of the phone back in the mail as I only had a limited amount of time to “accept’ the situation.
We went into the store on December 10th, and explained the situation to a clerk (this is in Austin, TX at the Parmer Lane/35 locale) and he immediately got on the phone to call someone in billing, I believe. They immediately agreed to reduce the balance of the phone which was approximately $450, down to a cost of $175 which we were told was the deductible for the broken screen. We objected since we did not break this screen, but we were given no choiee in the matter and put it on a credit card. Still unhappy, it was our only option offered. The clerk even said “Seems like a fair deal.”, to which we replied, “For who?” As we were walking away from the counter, the clerk said, “Wait, don’t forget your phone.” We hesitated because we didn’t need or want that phone. It was no longer in service or being used.. It was the Jumped phone that we’d already sent in and were now being forced to pay a deductible for. We said “Why?”. He said “Well, it’s like a $700 phone….” and handed it to us. We walked away perplexed.
Not happy with this scenario, I began calling the next week about how this had transpired. One of the initial representatives said, “They were supposed to tell you that we’d apply that to your bill.” That was never mentioned in the store. Not once. At that time the credit of the $175 would have taken our bill down to $75 and that is exactly what the representative told us. “Your bill will be about $75 with this credit.” I was fine at that point.
However, I soon discovered OTHERWISE.
ISSUE #2
I never look at the detailed billing because frankly it’s VERY difficult to read, way too many “other/extra” charges and fees and it’s just not a user-friendly thing. However, I looked at the bill because our next bill was suddenly over $1,000. Out of nowhere. Upon looking, not only did T-Mobile RECHARGE the cost of the phone FULLY onto our plan, but I discovered that I was being charged DOUBLE for a phone on the 2nd line – A PHONE THAT WAS SENT BACK ON A JUMP ONA NOTE 4 PHONE FROM SEPTEMBER 2015! IN FACT, there were now only three payments left. I began looking at previous months bills and realized this $30 double billing had been taking place since AT LEAST FEBRUARY 2016 which was as far back as I could go online.
WHAT?
I began calling immediately. This was before Christmas. Today is FEBRUARY 8, 2017.
I have spent a total of OVER TEN HOURS ON THE PHONE WITH VARIOUS REPRESENTATIVES AND DEPARTMENTS FROM “Customer Service” and “Customer Loyalty”.
Each one has had a different “remedy” or explanation – or even ability – to research this, understand what I’m saying, deal with an increasingly agitated and angry customer – wait, a FIFTEEN YEAR CUSTOMER – to see that you, T-Mobile, owed me a credit of about $900. ESPECIALLY when once a Handset Research investigation was conducted TWICE and that it was able to be seen that there was NO ACTIVITY ON THAT PHONE since August 2015!!!, completely backing up my claim that somehow the phone had been lost in the mailing system or perhaps, even your warehouses. I even suggested that internal theft might have occurred, to which one representative “Glenda” said, “Oh no sir, I know everyone here loves their job as much as I do and that would never happen.” The FACT is internal theft happens in pretty much EVERY company or departments like “Loss Prevention” would not exist. It happens, and you know it does, and for a customer service representative to utter this to a pissed off customer is unacceptable.
One representative even “agreed to do me a favor” – and that was to “lower my level of service” in order to MASK the $30 charge on the 1st phone being put back on the plan – a phone we’ve refused to pay for. WHAT? I thought all T-Mobile employees were honest, and no one would ever do something dishonest just to cover the fact they can’t figure out how to fix a PROBLEM.
The (near) final straw was when upon returning to the store where the billing issue originated in December, to tell them I wanted this fixed, and I wasn’t leaving until it was done, an assistant manager (very friendly, named Brian, I believe) went through the customer service screens, did show me where one credit was applied on 1/27 (however, he gave me the wrong information – saying the credit was for the lost Note 4 when in fact the credit was for the Jumped Galaxy Edge 7) and that there was a 2nd credit wating to be cleared on 2/6. I asked him if he was sure and he said emphatically YES.
On the morning of 2/7, I checked the account and no, emphatically NO, it was NOT processed. These credits had been initiated by “Erica” in Customer Loyalty on 1MID- /16, the day in which she also promised that a 30-day Collection Hold would be placed on the account to prevent any service interruptions. She was the ONLY one who finally SAW what happened, where the billing issues originated from, discovered that there’d been no activity on the NOTE in nearly a year & 1/2, and seemed to have everything lined up. I felt “victorious” that the message had finally gotten through and was looking for that credit to take care of the current month’s payment.
ABSOLUTE FINAL STRAW TODAY – So imagine my surprise when this morning, 2/8, I go to make a phone call and find my services interrupted. The “30-day collection hold” was to PREVENT this, one of the many reasons behind my multiple phone calls over the last two months, and 30 days from 2/16 would be February 16th, not today, February 8th, when this is still sitting there UNRESOLVED.,
UNACCEPTABLE.
I was forced through the online system to pay my “past due” balance (which really wasn’t, given that I still had $450 in credits coming) before my service would be restored, plus acknowledge that a $20 per line fee would be assessed. As you can imagine, I’M PRETTY LIVID ABOUT THIS.
I got through to a customer service agent, and I’m fairly certain it would have rolled me over to Customer Loyalty, someone named Philip. And of course, he “assured” me that he could get all this “taken care of”. I informed him I had an appointment in less than 10 minutes, but I very quickly told him that I was going to the Attorney General and the Consumer Protection Agency with this, that I was done with phone calls and visits, and that you guys are just appearing to rip people off, and feel like you can get away with it.
ALL OF A SUDDEN, PHILIP HAS MAGICAL POWERS OF BEING ABLE TO CREDIT THE REMAINING ITEMS OFF. On THAT phone call.
AFTER I’d been forced to make a payment.
WHAT?
This practice is suspect, to say the least, and to force the amount of stress you have on me with ten different phone calls, mindless stupidity games with multiple scenarios and suppositions by your representatives, to having to listen to one tell me “God Is Good Everyday” (Great for you, dearie, I didn’t call the church)…. I’m just floored that someone I’ve done business with for SO long and have been a faithful customer of can allow this level of “service” to exist. I’ll never refer another customer to you and by documenting this, hashtagging what I will, I will let others know to check their bills within every scrutinized line they can. You don’t know my personal financial arrangements, but $450 x TWO is a tremendous amount of money to spread out, but the bigger picture is: THIS IS JUST WRONG.
Best of luck to you, but we WILL be shopping other services when our contract on these phones is up.
#tmobilecustomerservice
#tmobiletheft
#tmobileattorneygeneral
#consumerprotectionagency
