Sprint/Nextel (yes, ANY cell company) - Bad Policy February 2006

This one deserves a new post, even though we've already got one on the shady cell phone companies. We return to our hero, heading to a Sprint/Nextel Store. Sprint has merged with Nextel, officially as of last year some time.

Here in Winston-Salem, there is only one Sprint store. This causes it to be crowded, even before it opens. I showed up as the doors were being unlocked and there were seven people in front of me. Nuts. Luckily there was only about a 15/20 minute wait.

The issue: My phone screen stopped working. Overnight. No fault of my own. What was once a colorful bastion of information alerting me to who had called and what my friend's numbers were was now an almost-black image, a blur.

About a year ago, my sister-in-law had a problem with her Sprint screen, they replaced it for free, then when it failed again, replaced the phone. I thought: no big deal.

Other policy: Sprint has a 2 year window between when you get a new phone and can get another new phone, at least at their lovely "discount" prices. My two year comes up in October and I am pro-rated $75 as of right now. Doesn't sound too bad.

Apparently, since Nextel and Sprint merged, they did some shifting in the dictionary while they were at it. Most notably in the term "insurance." When I got my phone, insurance was explained as an unfortunate drop, loss, or a semi truck running over the phone. Since the merger, "insurance" is something that covers the maintenance on any phone for any reason. I don't know where the memo was, but I didn't see it.

So because the product is faulty, I get to shell out $55 for the repair. I looked at my other option: a new phone at regular price costs a minimum of $200, minus the $75 (we're at $125), plus $36 activation fee ($161). That's right, even though I've had the service for years and years, I still get nailed with an activation fee. That's also new. So $161 or $55?

Bad Policy, Sprint. You don't get Bad Business because it turned out to be a dirty connector and I was charged nothing for the fix. But that doesn't mean that the practices you have are just.

Lesson? Honestly, with the number of business mergers going on and the number of services we subscribe to lead us down a black hole of neverending small print. Unless we read every bit of every piece of mail, whether we think it's junk or not, we'll still never know all the points and policies of these varied services until we force them to be upfront on all pricing issues. If it affects the consumer or might affect the consumer financially, it should be posted in plain print in a friggin' grid on a piece of paper that we can use to coat the fridge. Only we can make it clear that getting ripped off is not cool.

Advice? Bitch and moan. If something's not fair and you're paying money for it, let the supplier know it. When a war erupts not for better pricing but better service, we've succeeded.

Verizon/Sprint (or Any Cell Company) - Bad Business July/August 2002

So a couple of years ago, I was sitting pretty with Verizon. Except that every month, I went over my minutes. Seeing an ad on TV, I called to see if I could get the deal. Verizon was very good about upgrading your plan. Unfortunately, it turned out that I only had a "dual-mode" phone. I needed at "tri-mode" phone in order to get the deal. To get that, of course, required a two-year contract.

But this whole thing soured me. Why would I rejoin a contract that was limiting me so?

I decided to abort. The first woman I spoke to said that it would be over $100 to cancel my contract. Really? Because when I signed up, no one mentioned the excess fees involved in cancelling (Remember Lease prices before the big disclosure scandal?). So I stayed for another month and called back. This woman said that it would be about $40 to cancel. Sweet. I talked to my wife, set up an account with Sprint, and called them back. Suddenly, it was over $100 again.

What?

So I dumped on a supervisor. This was not acceptable. But after wrangling and complaining, I still was only let off at about $87.

Point being: Get the cancellation info in writing before you commit. They're all shady.

_____

My one friend was happy with Sprint forever. Praised them whenever he had a chance.

But then he went to Mexico.

He was sold a package that would allow him to call home in the US for a very small fee. The package cost about $75. When he got down there, he could rarely get connected. And when he got back, he found that the times he did get connected cost him several hundred dollars.

Did I mention that this was his honeymoon?

So, speaking to a supervisor, he found out that the package never shoud have been sold to him, especially by a lower-level, local person. But they wouldn't reduce his bill.

He spent a good deal of his wedding money paying for Sprint's goof.

Lesson: Speak to a supervisor before purchasing ANY plan.