Riding Herd

I had a very simmilar experience, I will include my email to AT&T below!

summary : phone crapped out, got crappy service, but eventually a new phone (but I had to pay). My phone actualy broke a second time, and I just went straight to audiovox. It will suck when starcom picks it all up, then we will be true orphans!

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am a new customer to AT&T/Cingular, after being a long term (6+
years) customer of Verizon. I have been waiting for some time for
certain features in a phone, and AT&T came forward out with a phone
that met those needs (namely, MS Smartphone, and bluetooth) in the
Audiovox SMT 5600

Actually, Cingular came out with a similar phone, the Motorola mpx220,
however based on several reviews, I chose to go with the Audiovox.

I purchased the phone on 10/24.

I was very pleased. I got great customer service from the rep in the
store (O---, in the -----, IA store) who answered my few
remaining questions about the phone itself (he was using that same
model as his own phone), and my questions about the available plans.

I showed my phone off to everyone I work with, and got several people
interested in potentially buying the same phone.

This Sunday (10/14) my phone rang, and I pushed the answer button.
The phone did not pick up the call, and the phone appeared to lock up.
It would not respond to any button pushing, including trying to turn
the phone off. The incoming call screen remained on the screen. I
took the battery out of the phone, even with no power, the incoming
call screen stayed up (Pretty impressive actually)

I took my girlfriend's phone (also an AT&T phone), and called 611, to
get some help.

They went through some things to try on the phone, and determined it
was dead. They eventually told me to go back to the store, and get a
replacement phone.

I drove back to the AT&T store in the mall, and talked to a
salesperson. While talking to that person, ---came in, recognized
me, remembered which phone I bought, and came over to ask if I was
having a problem (So far, ----has been very helpful!)

They said they did not have any more of those phones in stock, and
would likely not get any more of them in ever, as due to the merger,
that phone was being discontinued. This worried me, but then Omar
called the ---- ---- office, and they had a phone in stock.

---- said he would go to the ---- ----store, and get the phone for
me. He told me that he would likely not be able to get the phone for
me until Tuesday. In the interim, he gave me a loaner phone (a
significantly inferior model, but as a temporary measure, acceptable)
and told me to come back Tuesday.

I came back on Tuesday. ---- was not there, but I talked to another
salesperson. (I believe this guy was named ---- , but I am not 100%
sure) He told me ---- had not brought in the phone, and since I did
not have the box (which by the way, nobody ever told me that getting
warranty was dependant on me having the box), I was pretty much SOL. I
protested, and he called the ---- ----office again, ---- had not
picked up the phone, and now the ---- ---- office was out of stock,
and they would not be getting any more in.

He told me to call Warranty Replacement. I asked for the number, and
to use the in store phone. I then waited on hold for 50 minutes. 50
minutes on hold is in itself quite infuriating. This brought the time
to 9:10, and the store was closed. Jeremy told me I had to leave.

I went home, and called the customer service number again.

The first person I talked to tole me I had to go back to the store and
have them replace it. I asked to speak to a supervisor. I then got
----- who was very sympathetic, and said she would try to
resolve the issue. She again tried some various technical things,
which did not work, and then said we would need to do Warranty
replacement.

She put me on hold, and called Warranty Replacement for me. When she
came back, she told me that Warranty was no longer handling this model
of phone, but I could get any other phone I wanted from the store.

I SWITCHED TO AT&T FOR THIS PHONE. And the store does not carry any
equivalent phone (The Motorola, is apparently only carried in Best
Buy, and is in the process of a recall)

---- then said we could try some more advanced technical attempts to
fix the problem. She then put me on hold for 30 minutes (In her
defense, she did come back every few minutes and tell me it would be a
few more minutes)

In the end, I got disconnected from her. I think she may have gone
the extra mile, and tried to call me back, because the loaner phone
rang with a number, but when I tried to answer it, there was nobody on
the other end. I called back the number, and it was cingular. I
waited on the line again, got a first tier rep, asked to be
transferred to ---- several times (he stonewalled me on that, and
tried to solve the problem himself) then got transferred to a
supervisor again.

I explained everything (AGAIN!) to the supervisor. ----- said I needed
to go back to the store!

I stopped that entire line of dialogue in its' tracks. She looked some
stuff up and said, she could find no record of this phone being
available, or of ever being available in the past!

She told me warranty could give me a new phone, but that model and
feature compatibility was not guaranteed.

This is unacceptable, I bought the phone (and your service, and paid
termination fees at Verizon, for these specific features).

She then told me that I should call Audiovox myself, to see if they
would replace it for me (under unspecified terms I might add). I did
not buy my phone from Audiovox. I bought my phone from you.

I am your core market. I buy high end phones, and lots of accessories.
I use my cell phone as my only form of telephone. I upgrade almost
every year to get more powerful phones (Which means I buy at full
price!). I have a large network of friends and family, all with high
disposable income (3 of which are already on AT&T, and several which
are thinking of switching on my recommendation). My recommendation is
rapidly changing.

I fully realize that you are in a merger, which creates some
confusion, but the level of service I got was unacceptable.

I also fully realize that as part of a product lifecycle, different
models go out of support. This is a phone that first became available
less than two months ago, and that I purchased less than 30 days ago.
There should be 0 issues getting support for this phone.

Thus far my experience with AT&T/Cingular has been horrible, with
occasional glimpses of light from Omar and Miriam. They should be
rewarded for trying their best in a tough situation. But your
processes and policies need serious rework.

I want one of the following :

Fix my phone.
Give me a new Audiovox 5600 (amazon still has them on sale, buy one from them!).
Give me an equivalent phone (MS smartphone 2003se,bluetooth, camera)
Cancel my service, refund the price I paid for the phone, refund me
for the features that I am paying for, but not able to use (unlimited
data) and reimburse me for my early termination fees so I can go back
to Verizon.

Above all, let me talk to one person, who will take ownership of my
issue, and not keep trying to pass me off in circles.