News to Use

This ladies and genlemen is why companies like AT&T and Verizon get in hot water all the time. Their staffs are untrained and do not know the policies of the company. This is just one instance of one aspect of company contracts with AT&T. But it is symptomatic of what is wrong with the whole industry. –

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The Consumers Union said that AT&T Wireless sales representatives provided false information about the company’s policy toward early termination fees during a mystery shopping exercise carried out by the public interest group last week.

In several phone calls made by an employee of the Consumers Union, some salesmen at AT&T Wireless said the company had implemented a policy pro rating the fees and provided details of that policy.

One salesman said the company’s policy was that after the first year of a standard two-year service contract with AT&T Wireless, the early termination fee is cut in half.

Another said that the fees gradually reduced over the term of the contract.

But in reality, while the company announced last year that it was planning on changing its early termination fees, but has yet to announce any details of what its new policy is.

According to Mark Siegel, an AT&T Wireless spokesman, the company continues to charge $175 to any customer who wants to break his service contract with the company.

Siegel wouldn’t say when the company would announce details of changes to this policy, nor when the changes would be implemented by AT&T.

Siegel apologized for the false information provided by the company’s salespeople.

What is the symptom? Firms like Verizon and AT&T are caught between a squeeze. They are dumping talent in droves, yet the automation that was to be the fall back position has not kicked in or is inadequate. Used to be in a Telco, polices existed to treat customers fairly and evenly. Management knew that backend processes in many cases were hopelessly inadequate but trained staff knew how to resolve it for the customer. The old line ‘Success was dependent on who you knew not what the computer told you.’ was apt up to about 5 years ago. No longer. So action just falls thru the bit bucket.

It also explains why you get things like this occuring.

What can you do? Well when the contract terms change, rate or service that your chance to bail out with no ETF chagres. You need to keep your original receipts and understand the contract. But based on this you have the upper hand. But you will need to escalate beyond the 1st level CSR to get satisfaction.

Linky.