Milk is the same price per gallon at your grocery store no matter who drinks it. And there's gotta be a law against charging some people in a neighborhood more than others for their kilowatt-hours. Has someone started a cell phone carrier yet that just charges everyone the same hourly rate based on how much time they use? That works with every phone? Because that would make sense, wouldn't it?
I switched to T-Mobile in December, explained to the guy at the counter how many minutes I used based on my past history, and he got me set up on what looked like it was the right plan for me with the right amount of minutes plus unlimited data and text. I didn't ask for a document containing proof of the name of which plan I chose with his help, as it didn't occur to me that there would be a discrepancy later (my first mistake). I set up an automatic payment (my second mistake) and trusted T-Mobile (my real mistake). By trusted, I mean, I didn't check the next month to make sure they were charging me the rate they were supposed to. I'm not a paranoid person, or at least I wasn't in December. I'm busy, and I reviewed the guy's recommendation, and thought it was all fine.
NOT!
Had a look at my bill the other night and WHOA! I've been going hundreds of minutes over the monthly allotment every month since I had the new phone! Wasn't on the right plan at all.
So I called T-Mobile to tell them there must have been some mistake. They told me the mistake was mine - not checking up on them sooner. If I had called within 60 days, they could have helped me, but at 90 days, it was my own fault.
Seems so reasonable, right? Let's think about it. We cheat you, and if you notice right away, we'll say, "OK, we're so busted", and we'll make you whole. If you don't notice right away though, we'll keep your money. It's perfectly easy for us to see that there was a mistake - you signed up for a new plan and you're using double the minutes the plan gives you. We have your phone number and it would be so easy to call you and tell you that there's been a mistake. But we don't! We cross our fingers and hope we can just get past the 60 day mark, and then we're home free. No such thing as satisfaction guaranteed with us!
I asked them then, what it would cost to get unlimited calling. Well, it turns out that they have a plan where for the same price I was paying for 500 minutes, I can get unlimited minutes. "We want to save you money", said the call center representative.
Huh! Is that why you were charging me $.40/minute for hundreds of minutes each month, which obviously should have been coming to me for free (since I now am on a plan that gives me unlimited calls for the same price?) Do you have ANY costs-of-goods-sold rationale for why my minutes should cost .$40 each?
What a bunch of scammers these cell phone carrier companies are, with their hundreds of complicated different plans and their hidden deadlines and their different prices for minutes depending who's using them and whether you already used some or not. The pricing's all completely fake anyway. I'm tired of being jerked around, and everyone else is too.
What a great opportunity for someone to start a carrier business where a minute is a minute is a minute. Your real savings would be in the call center staff and billing departments. Just use an open-source program and have all customer service done over email, which would be ok since there wouldn't be much since your billing is so simple and clean.
Grr. Really just wanted to make a public statement saying how much T-Mobile sucks. Telling me it's my own fault for not checking their work - though certainly true - is just proof that they're happy to screw their own customers every chance they get. There should be a better way.
Just a little shout-out to my peeps:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOY9bg3kUAw&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTogqJbUSos
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eREN9IadtNk&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZWpBnYz35A&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zujZk2CHBA&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACXIgD8s78U&NR=1
Or, you know, go metric.
That is, the whole world uses the metric system except for the US and a handful of other US dependent countries.
Just like the whole rest of the world doesn't have to buy mobile phone 'plans'. They don't have to sign 'contracts'. They buy minutes, and that's that.
Posted by: s | April 13, 2009 at 12:31 PM