AT&T Wireless Saga Part 2

Everything went smooth for a few months. Then I noticed I'd go a couple of days without a text message. I'd send my friends a test text asking for a reply. I'd never get one. I'd call AT&T and the usual power down, remove sim card and battery and put it back together routine. It would work for a while and then start over again. I'd call again and they'd do what little troubleshooting they could do over the phone. It was a cat and mouse game. Then the routine got old.

The whole problem reached an apex two weekends ago when I was in San Antonio. I wasn't getting text messages, phone calls or voicemails. I had to call AT&T three times and still I had lingering problems. One customer service rep tried to tell me it was because I wasn't in my home area. I call bullshit on that. They have all these commercials about nationwide coverage and they can't get me a message or call 200 miles away from my home? One of the reps was nice enough to credit my account $25. Another rep was just a dumbass. He could never quiet understand my problem. The third said to go into a store when I get back to Houston and they will replace my sim card.

I'm pissed off all weekend because I have friends I want to see and can't make plans cause I can't communicate with them.

The real pisser happened after I got home. Someone left me a voicemail on Saturday and it didn't show up in my voicemail inbox until Tuesday. I was extremely pissed off at that moment. I called AT&T immediately and told them what happened. Again they offered to replace the sim card.

I finally got the sim card replaced this week. I again went out of town. Between work and out of town I didn't have time to change it until two nights ago.

I got into the habit of calling AT&T every time something went wrong. I wanted to leave a phone record of all my complaints. At the very least, if they didn't document my exact problem someone could see I've repeatedly called. I told one rep that I didn't think the sim card replacement would work.

And the result with the new card? The same garbage. More missed text messages, text messages received in duplicate and sent in triplicate. One buddy told me to quit texting because everything was coming across three times.

I've about had it. AT&T has offered to replace the phone. As far as I'm concerned it's a last grasp hail mary. If this doesn't work I'm going to cancel my account whether or not I have to pay the disconnect fee.

Yesterday again I had trouble with text messages. I have seven verified messages sent by others that I didn't receive. So I called in today to once again make it know I was having issues. I asked the rep at what point does this become an exercise in futility? When does it become a point where I can cancel my contract without penalty? His reply was under the terms of contract I have to pay a penalty. I replied with a simple fact. I don't pay for my service my phone gets disconnected but if I don't get service I can't cancel my contract. Again he repeated his claim of contract terms don't allow it. I reminded him that their are two parties to a contract. I pay for services provided by AT&T and if I don't get the services then AT&T isn't living up to their end of the contract. I could tell I was frustrating him with simple logic. Finally he told me that if the new phone fails to talk to a manager and they have the power to waive the fee. I asked is it impossible to get a manager to do and he said it was pretty close to impossible. He said it would take an extreme case to get the fee waived.

Finally I asked the rep to please document the fact that I'm having problems again with the text messaging. He obliged and read back to me all that he wrote. I thanked him since I overwhelmed him with logic.

Tomorrow I'm going to try and get the new phone. Like the sim card replacement, I don't think a new phone will work either. This problem has happened over the course of two different phone models. I seriously doubt a third will be any different.

AT&T's service, for whatever reason, has turned into total garbage for me. The customer service was horrible with the LG-Vu until I threatened to cancel. This time around customer service has been more understanding and better but still equally worthless. If the third phone doesn't work I'll cancel service whether I have to pay early termination or not.