Gophones are great. 10 cents a call, 100.00 a year. We were paying big for phone connectivity, mostly for phones to let us locate each other in a supermarket.
OTOH, AT&T conducts psychological warfare against go-phone users: it has 4 layers of bots, some of them that loop, and some of which deliver you to live (but dead black screens with no sound which really do produce a voice now and again telling you to stay on the line, before they finally drop the call and you have to re-dial.)
Speaking Latin to some bots will get you to customer service, when repeatedly hitting 0 only prompts the bot to hang up. “Gallia est omnis divisa” is a phrase that confuses them.
But if you get a regular rep, they will tell you they are fixing things, but they don’t stay fixed. To get at that level usually involves a supervisor, who will still screw things up. My problem took two hours on the phone and involved my ‘automatic’ renewal account, in which they are supposed to charge your account 102.00 and set you right for another year. Yet—I get bot messages on my computer that says it’s going to expire and I have to manually refill it. So–I got a supervisor to assure me she had fixed that problem and the thing would automatically refill. Wrong: I got a phone text saying refill had ‘failed.’ Second go at the phone. Another hour, and finally another supervisor who got an earful, and manually put the charge through. It took.
Then today—JANE’S phone ran out, despite the automatic refill order. Another hour getting through the bots to a person, who said HER automatic payment had ‘failed.’ Well, guess what: we got online with our CC company, who assured us there’s nothing wrong with her account either—it’s AT&T not sending the proper request to the CC company, ie, routine practice for every corporation on the planet when it wants to get paid. HER help at AT&T is investigating and will ‘call her back.’ Meanwhile she has the transcript from the card company printed out and is ready to read AT*T the riot act.
Are we pissed? Yea, verily. Jane’s situation still isn’t settled, but I detect a common thread of ‘failed’ when it comes to AT&T sending proper request for autopayment to a credit card company. Can you say MASSIVE FAIL here?
And we remembered when I got sick, we hadn’t turned off our Ipad data plan. Also AT&T. Groan. Then in a call to our store I obtained the holy grail—a salesman where we got our Ipad told us the direct number the salesmen use for AT&T, which only goes through ONE bot, and if you select item two and speak Latin to it, you get a pass through to a live agent, taking only about 15 minutes to find out that the salesman who told us we always had to come in or phone in to reinstate the data plan probably wanted to log a customer contact —we found out you can buy or or turn off a plan automatically from the Settings screen in the Ipad. So that, at least, is handled.
Jane’s still waiting for the guy from AT&T to call her back.
I wonder how many millions of computer charges have now bounced back on AT&T because one of their bots has screwed up?
THE phone company in the USofA — and who has the most screwed-up phone system in the country? Oh, yeah……..
Hope you’re all fixed. Wish you could bill ’em for your time.
I like Credo Mobile. Their customer service is quite good. AND they don’t give money to politicians I hate.
Speaking in tongues to the bots is a hoot!
A couple of things:
Ms. Cherryh sez: “Gallia est omnis divisa” is a phrase that confuses them.
Well, it confused me too the first time I ran into it in the 7th grade. I went to a school that fed us Latin in the 7th and 8th grades.
And ATT really blows. Aside from crappy customer service, the coverage where I live-not the sticks, Oakland, CA-stinks. It’s a rare call that doesn’t drop.
If you don’t like the phone company you should watch The President’s Analyst. I won’t say more.
The text for a class in computer programming languages, International Algorithmic Language “Algol” specifically, began: “Algol is divided into three parts.” But nobody groaned. 😉
That…..is delightfully sick.
I have one of my own invention about Boysenberries and nearly the same subject. 😉 (And some people have not groaned at that one also, because they were still waiting for the punchline.)
Julio made a long traversal to see how the fort ran….
Oh, I have seen that one multiple times. 😉
Wouldja believe it’s 3pm and we STILL haven’t heard from AT&T?
Is there any reason you have to use AT&T? I use a Tracfone that uses Verizon lines and get very good reception. I buy minutes as I need them and it has been working out to about $10-$12 a month. There are 2 different types of phones, verizon and I think AT&T, and a lot of models. I bought a new LG on e-bay for $17. I think it was an older model but it texts, has a calender, alarm etc.
Gophone: store was closest to our house—then, not now. Our first go-phones were 8.00. These are a whopping 30. And worlds better tech. But Verizon, when you get into data-use re the iPad, insists you buy a plan for huge sums, and Verizon’s where we came from. AT&T lets us switch data on and off like a lightbulb for a very small charge, but their customer service is somewhere below that of, say, Amazon, imho. All bots and no people. Just—if you’re going to need phone service in the great outback of the American west, Verizon has had better coverage.
Now we’re looking at Netzero for 4g coverage for the iPad, but NZ doesn’t have coverage where we usually operate.
I think we know exactly what went on, and I’ll bet AT&T is royally screwed up re credit card charges right now…
I understand Verizon is having an outage in California.
Mercury (god of communications) must be in retrograde.
When or if I get to upgrade my iPhone and later my iPad, I would really like to move away from AT&T to some other carrier. Not a fan of AT&T these days either. Love my old iPhone 3GS (except in bright sun). Love my old iPad 2 too. I really want the iPhone 5, but it’s waiting on my budget. I can wait another rev or two on a new iPad.
That is just brilliant. If I knew Klingon, I’d try that! Hmm, but I can do a passable almost Middle English….
Well, let me tell you about AT8T 4g—non-existent, for those of us who don’t have a smartphone. Our iPad has it. It’s an AT&T iPad. But it can’t get 4g from AT&T. The access to THEIR 4g is through the smartphones, and you have to have an AT&T smartphone with access. BUT—there are more roadblocks. Look up the word ‘tether’, meaning connectivity for other devices, and you’ll find AT&T is deficient. THere are AT&T devices you can get to create a hotspot—hand over another hundred dollars and, oh, yes, you must have a smartphone—hand over another hundred—a month—
The good news is, we have found most hotel situations offer connectivity we can access via the iPad. ANd at one hotel, on the road, it was real nice to catch one of our regular tv programs via streaming. Can’t do that except where there’s highspeed connection, which is rare at the class of hotel we stay at.
Main thing is, do a lot of reading before you spring for the 4g stuff. WE got ours when we’d intended to get 3g because there was a very narrow price difference due to some circumstance I can’t now recall, but let’s say it functions at less than it could do…I think this one had been returned.
We got it for 2 reasons: ability to use the Square in transactions at conventions and b: ability to do cover-displays of the e-covers, which just weren’t impactful as printout. The cycling display is an attention-getter, and if we’re to compete, when others have these displays, we felt we’d better keep up. It has other bennies…quick access to weather. FOrget Angry Birds. WE’re talking business stuff. We can show people things. And we can turn the plan off and on with AT&T, which we were told we couldn’t with Verizon. Sigh. It’s all a shell game, constantly moving, details, exceptions, and subclauses, except on Tuesdays, if the moon is full. But over all, we think it was a good decision. OR will be…if we can use it to attract people to ask questions.
Boy, now that I think back to ShejiCon3, I really did screw up that first sentence, didn’t I? You were nice enough to tell me that I got the idea across without actually parroting Caesar. When I think back on how hard I worked to memorize the entire chapter for my sophomore year Latin II class, because we had to stand up in front of the class and recite it. I skipped one whole sentence somewhere in the middle, I recall it had to to with one of the rivers, (flumina), but not which one. Belgae, Germani, Helvetii……and then, Romani!
I don’t even plan to get 4G in any flavor, at least not in the foreseeable future. Not having a need for it is a big reason, and I really hate to pay for things I’m not going to use. Where I am, 3G is fine, I get what I need, it doesn’t take forever to get to me, and I can access it almost anywhere in my local area. Your experience is why Consumer Reports readers voted AT&T one of the worst carriers for service coverage, reliability, and customer satisfaction.
One is reminded of the old Lily Tomlin skit on SNL as Ernestine: We don’t care, we don’t have to…we’re the phone company. That was 1976. How little some things change.
ON WHAT?!?! Try “Laugh-In”, so 30 years earlier. You know, the show that got Richard Nixon elected because he appeared on it?
Paul, I’m aware she started the character Ernestine on Laugh-In. The particular sketch I referenced was performed on SNL in 1976 (Season 2 Episode 1, September 18, 1976), after ATT offered to pay her $500000 to play Ernestine in a commercial. You do know SNL started in 1975, yes?
One ringy-dingy. Two ringy-dingy…
Mr. Veedl? *snort* *snort* Mr. Veedl?
“Is this the party to whom I am speaking?”
IMHO, “Have I reached the party to whom I am speaking?” is one of the greatest comedic lines of all time. Tough to choose between Ernestine the telephone operator and Edith Ann as the one I liked best. And that’s the truth, thbthth.
Tell me about ATT customer service! It took me four tries and two service calls to get my wireless internet fixed. I simply could not convince anyone my modem was going out. When I finally did get a service guy to come out, he replaced it with a different model that had such a puny signal (“interference from other wireless networks in the neighborhood”[sic]) that as soon as you left my office, the signal dropped out. Then they had the unmitigated gall to tell me if I wanted a better signal, I needed to spend my own money to buy a wireless router to make their equipment work the way it was supposed to!! Finally got the service guy back out again to replace the modem with the same model I had before, and I could get a wireless signal all over the house again. I was definitely feeling like John Cleese’s character in the Dead Parrot Sketch. However, they did give me a $150 credit on my bill. I have a go phone too, and I repeatedly have trouble refilling it. The website does not work and hasn’t worked for years. I think ATT’s motto is “We may not be the only phone company in town but we sure try to act like it.”
Oh, and BTW:
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2012/10/magic-and-negotiation-cj-cherryhs-fortess-sequels?utm_source=Feedburner%3A+Frontpage+Partial+RSS+Feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Torcom%2FFrontpage_Partial+%28Tor.com+Frontpage+Partial+-+Blog+and+Stories%29
Nice review.
Whenever I run into someone who says the government should be run like a corporation I say “Oh you mean like AT&T?” That shuts them up.
I’m hoping Softbank is successful in their bids to get into the US market. Everyone I know who moved to Japan says their service is great.
Actually, AT&T is taking lessons from a certain author’s books where the hero almost ALWAYS has trouble making an international call.
I have yet to hear even one good thing about any of the cell phone companies…except TracFone, which a friend of mine uses for exactly the same reasons you do, CJ.
A good friend of mine uses C-Spire (local company, used to be Cellular South). They got bought by AT&T. So far she hasn’t had much problem BUT…she has a smartphone, and sets aside money for the phone, because she does use it a great deal in her work and in “regular life.”
So she’s happy. But she too admits that customer service from the company itself is awful; if she happens to have a problem with the phone she usually hunts the information down herself on the ‘Net or makes a visit to the store. That’s not always a good use of time for others, obviously.
As for me, I feel lucky to even have a cell phone (Safelink phone) and the damn thing makes me feel stupid even though it isn’t one of the new-fangled ones. My friend’s smart phone makes me REALLY feel dumb. “Where are the buttons?” (Yes, really, I asked that the first time I handled the phone.)
There are things that I see as useful about these devices; like you said, business uses. None of the “play” aspects of smart phones and tablets really appeal to me. Using them for organization, information, displays in meetings? Sure! My boss wants to get one so she can play movies on it…and I can’t help but look at her in confusion and ask her, “But don’t you have a computer for that?”
This is a well documented business practice of ATT designed to seize any balance in GoPhone accounts. They will do anything they can to prolong your agony and try and steal your money. Even if you don’t carry a balance, you get caught in the same cesspool. You have to stay on the phone until you reach a supervisor.
I carried over a $500 balance from Bell South days and they went after me. My solution was to terminate the auto-refill that had worked well with Bell South and do it manually. I haven’t had any problems with them since I went to the manual refill. I refill for 3 months at a time and get the very lowest rate possible.
We just did exactly the same thing—and filed a complaint about the practice with the Federal Trade Commission. They’re governed by the FCC, but that’s about their communications; this is about their dealings with consumers, so we’ll see if, past the politics of their political donations, anything ever happens with it. The action that’s likely to get more mileage is letting the sad tale reverberate through the social media—I turned up one person who used to work for them who says it’s well known internally that the billing section is corrupt, unquote. Rotten to the core sort of describes it. More and more people are turning up saying this is a problem dating back at least a decade. And while you’re on endless hold, their bot-voice intones ‘use autopay’ in some form or another, over and over and over. Who’s going to get stung by this? The elderly, the poor, the people who can’t drop everything and pursue it—I wonder if the IRS would be interested in what blank AT&T uses to report this ill-gotten gain? I wonder if they call it ‘funds ripped off from consumers by a scam.’
Be advised that they will send you a txt saying it is time to refill your account before it is really time to do it. I always check my account online when the txt arrives to know the exact date of balance expiration, etc, and refill accordingly. It’s ridiculous to have to do this sort of thing.