AT&T Did a Number on Me, (not a phone number)

I just found out that Dolly Parton is a real live human being and not a Barbie Doll that was lifted to extreme heights on a platform, during a lightning storm, by a fellow named Dr. Frankenstein! For some reason that seems likely to me for an explanation. Oh well, it's one of those nights.

I did accomplish something today worthy of writing about. I have been a customer of AT&T's for 22 months now. I have a Blackberry telephone that I'm more than pleased with. I pay $111.00 per month for my privilege of being an AT&T customer. Accidentally, I learned that everyone else that has more minutes than me is paying less, so I called AT&T and spoke with a representative and she reduced my 900 minutes per month to 450 and allowed me to keep my rollover minutes, which is why I chose AT&T to begin with. That reduced my bill by $20, plus she explained that I would be allowed to have all mobile to mobile minutes free of any charge in an unlimited fashion. I reiterated, "all carriers"? She said yes, not just AT&T as before. Great, so my 450 minutes will only be affected by landline calls, plus I've got over 7000 minutes accumulated in my rollover minutes. I was more than pleased.

Then I spoke with another friend that also has AT&T and he told me he just got his data reduced to the minimum of 200 from unlimited and that saved him $20. So today, I called the mother company (AT&T) again and this time got a young lady that actually spoke English without any accent. She lowered my bill by another $20 per month by reducing my unlimited package to 200 Megabits. My bill is now $40 per month lower. I asked Sara to reiterate my package again and she omitted mentioning my mobile to "any" mobile portion, so I asked her about it. She said no, that is not on my package. I began getting irate as the first rep insisted it was good forever. We went up and back and Sara began apologizing for the previous reps mistake. I stopped her and explained that when a representative of AT&T enters into a contract with me, she is representing the company and "I'm sorry" just doesn't cut it.

Now I've been on the phone for about 30 minutes by this time and she asked me to hold while she spoke with a supervisor. Another 15 minutes went by when she asked if she could call me back? I mention that the conversation I'd had with the previous rep was taped according to what the message told me before I entered into a conversation with her and that if she had any doubts, she could go back and listen to the tape. She said they really don't use those and she has no way of finding out which location the girl came from. That's when I stopped believing her.

An hour later she finally returned my call, evidently the supervisor was out having a cigarette and here was my offer. She cannot do what I want, but she can offer me unlimited "any" mobile to any mobile plus unlimited texting that I really don't care about, for an additional $10. Now that's a good deal, I suspect, but NOT when I was given. I caved, mostly because I was bored with it and agreed to pay the additional 10 bucks. My contract is up in 2 months and I'm going to have to rethink AT&T. I'm also eligible for an iPhone for $99 and that will require more gigs if I get it. Plus it has a better camera!

Here's another thing. AT&T knew for the past 22 months that I had been oversold when I first got my phone and for 22 months they let me pay $40 too much. That doesn't create that warm and fuzzy feeling about AT&T, does it?