Saturday, May 27, 2006

Reasons To Hate The Telcos, Part 3

So, I get an email today, notifying me that my newest AT&T bill is available for my perusal online.

What? I canceled that account a month ago!

I open the email, click on the link therein, see the bill, which looks my old usual long distance bill: $12.72 for long distance service.

I call and explain that I have closed this account. I have my notes. I have the confirmation number written down and I offer to recite it.

Smarmy customer service twinkie declines my offer. Points out that I called to cancel on 4/21, but asked that the service not be terminated until 4/25, and during that time, "You called New York, you called Philadelphia, you called ....." Yada yada yada.

After I was intimidated into hanging up, I took a closer look at the bill. It turns out that I did make those calls, on 4/22. Total charges for all calls: $0.59. The rest of the charges are the monthly service this, the surcharge that, whatever.

Well, this is likely one of those things where the fine print will say that using the service in any part of a monthly service plan entitles them to charge me for the whole month, or some nonsense like that. Probably not worth fighting about -- it'll cost me more than twelve bucks in stomach acid, even if I do win.

So, they gave my calling data out to the NSA, they want to ruin the freedom of the Web, and now, they want to screw me out of twelve bucks.

Fuckers.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Whoa, whoa. What about prorating? I wouldn't roll on this one, yet. Make one more phone call, at least.

bjkeefe said...

In principle, you're right, Clare. But the pain of entering a bunch of information via keypad or crummy voice recognition system, then waiting on hold, then repeating all of the information to a human after listening to Muzak, all so I can hear an earful of unctuous boilerplate . . .

Just not worth it.

Maybe I'll write them a letter the next time I'm in a particularly sour mood.

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