Here is my list of buisinesses that I will never use again if I can help it.
When they were PacBell Wireless, they treated me so nice. Often reversing their numerous mistakes without much problem. Now they are Cingular Wireless. Last time I called, they reminded me they were not a public utility and could fuck me over as much as they wanted (paraphrase). They began charging me for SMS messages while roaming, at $0.60 a message (one minute of airtime). As PacBell, they did not. They completely refused to reverse the charges, because as they put it: I am completely responsible for charges while roaming and they can change the prices whenever they want with no warning. Even though I was freaking roaming in another Cingular Wireless area. They offered to sign me up for a plan that would cost me EXACTLY the same amount as I am paying now and I would not get charged and be able to roam everywhere in the western US for no addition fee. The catch: they wanted a year contract. No thanks. Next time I will use Nextel.
I bought a harddrive on their auction site, through an
outside vendor called iTop they mailed me the wrong one. I had to return
it through the vendor. It has taken me months and hours on the phone to
get my money back from EggHead. I mailed in back (registered) on August
21, 2000 and as of September 26, 2000 I still have not gotten my money
back.
Later Note: I finally got my money back.
They refused to sell me an electronic ticket. They then proceeded to lose one of my paper tickets. They ignore my letters and will not refund my money.
Also known as Pacific Bell. I have wasted countless hours fixing missbillings. Surprisingly (or not), PacBell wireless has treated me well. I guess thats the free market for you. correction: see Cingular Wireless above.
Its almost not worth going into since everybody has a horror story. I just do not understand how they can expect a working fellow to take off an entire day to wait for their delivery. Why they do not deliver to private residences on the weekend is beyond me. Even the UP Postal Service delivers on Saturday; and they are the government. Recent fun: on the second delivery (at 10:30AM, exactly the same time they missed me the first day), they checked the box that said they will be back the next day after 5:00PM. So, my partner dutifully got off work early and when she got home at 4:50PM, UPS had already been there with their final delivery. Yea. The idiot on the phone explained to me that it did not say "guaranteed" so I should not have expected it after 5:00PM. No joke.