I have a very important piece of advice for you that could save you a great deal of money in 2009. The advice comes as a result of my dealings with the New AT&T.
It has been three weeks since my last update — and I had hoped it would be the last update — about the company’s series of screw-ups. Over the Christmas weekend, they managed to score yet another blunder. Maybe they were feeling neglected here?
This saga began with lackluster service and a billing error in which they suspended my service for “nonpayment” despite my having previously signed up for Auto Pay. I canceled my landline telephone service, and with it, my long distance service, back in September, leaving DSL as the sole product I buy from them. (I have an iPhone through AT&T Wireless, but this particular division hasn’t given me a moment’s trouble.)
Back on the 7th of this month, I reported that AT&T screwed up the scheduling of a service appointment for spotty internet reception; not only did they not show up when they said they would, they rescheduled, failed to call me as they promised they would, so I missed them by minutes, and found a card hanging on my door indicating that there must be some as-yet-undiagnosed problem inside the apartment, and they would be billing me $85 for that diagnosis, even though, technically, they hadn’t fully diagnosed anything at all.
The next day, I managed to get a reasonable customer service tech who promised that I wouldn’t have to pay that $85 fee for which I had been given no warning, particularly since no tech ever came in my home and actually diagnosed what the problem was. She then surprised me by crediting me two months of internet service. It turns out that she had gone back and looked at the now-extensive notes on my account, realized what an “EPIC FAIL” AT&T has been committing, and attempted to do the right thing.
While I was pleasantly surprised, I wasn’t holding my breath. Turns out that was a wise choice.
As a “Christmas gift,” I received an email with my monthly statement. Given that they were attempting to block the $85 fee, and that they had credited me two months of service for DSL, which runs about $48 bucks a month, I was expecting that next bill to show a credit of $48; the service fee for December would have been zero, leaving a credit of $48 for January.
Oddly enough, though not surprisingly, the email stated that my monthly balance due was $117.24.
I had to call them from my parents’ house, and mom couldn’t believe how disorganized this company has become: it took literally an hour and ten minutes of being transferred from tech to tech, from department to department, to finally figure out what was going on. Here’s where that amount came from:
- First, the tech who promised no $85 fee did note it on the account. But the billing computer, which is a computer, not a human, ignored the note and just billed that fee anyway. Computers are supposed to only do what they’re programmed to do, so I still blame that tech for expecting a computer to take the time to read a comment.
- That tech did credit one month of internet service. Not two. Just one. So that amount did not include DSL service for the month of December. After much explanation and complaining, I finally got the credit for the second month I had previously been promised. I had never asked for two month’s of service, but after all they’ve put me through and after promising it to me, I was determined to get that much at least.
- The remaining balance due, after the $85 fee was credited, was for long distance service. Yes, they’re still billing me for long distance service on a phone line that has been disconnected since the second week of December. I can’t use their long distance service on a telephone line that won’t allow me to make calls, but apparently basic logic like this is a level too high for their billing system to figure out without help. It took being transferred to the long distance billing department to get this straightened out and to finally set my account to be DSL-only, which it has been, so that I won’t be billed for long distance service in the future. This, of course, is something we’ve already tried since September, but maybe this time it will actually work.
Last month, I took the extra precaution of de-enrolling from Auto-Pay, the convenient service that allows AT&T to automatically debit the amount due from your checking account. I’m glad I did that, and I strongly advice all of you to not sign up for any Auto-Pay option for any services you use, unless there’s no indication at all that the company has any proclivity toward the level of error that AT&T has demonstrated.
After all, it’s your money. If they’re going to be this irresponsible with they’re billing, the last thing you want them to have easy access to is your checking account. So my critical advice to you is this:
Do NOT enroll in Auto-Pay. Ever.
As soon as you do, these companies simply stop caring about how they treat you. They figure they’ve got your money locked in, so they can screw up the bill as much as they like; by the time you catch the error, the money’s already gone. And getting it back is like growing wings. And it’s our own fault, really, because we’ve eliminated the need for any kind of interaction: we’ve just told them to take control and “handle it.” We shouldn’t be surprised when they handle it they way they want to, not the way we want them to.
To add insult to injury, now that the billing has been worked out, and now that I’ve been assured that I have a zero balance and that next month’s bill will feature a zero balance as well, I received the same email from AT&T again this morning, showing that $117 balance. I’m going to assume that it’s another computer glitch. Regardless, now that I am once again in the driver’s seat when it comes to them getting money from me, I’ll send them a check in February; they are owed no money from me until then and they’ll get none.
But in the meantime, I’d like to offer AT&T a few suggestions to improve its service in 2009:
- Change your name. If this is the way you treat customers, you don’t deserve a well-established name with a history like AT&T. I realize that what is now AT&T isn’t the same company or companies that used to be AT&T through a series of mergers. But if you’re going to call yourself a big dog, act like one. Sticking the “new” ahead of your name only makes it worse: it’s a reminder that there was once an “old” AT&T that treated customers a lot better than the “new” one has treated me.
- Get your billing system fixed. Seriously. Something’s wrong. Big time. Most of us — me included, frankly — do not have the time to sit on hold waiting for you to fix billing errors month after month that shouldn’t be happening to begin with. Overhaul your system. Teach it to read. When a customer service rep leaves a “note” on an account, make sure that your billing system can process it and act accordingly.
- Get your automated answering system fixed. For one thing, don’t make me press anything to get English. This is America: it’s okay to assume that most of us are already capable of English. Offer me a button to select other languages as an alternative. That starts me off on the wrong mood before I ever get a person. Second, don’t ask me a lot of inane questions: there’s no point in my entering the telephone number or the last four digits of my social security number to the automated system if you’re then going to dump me at the terminal of a customer service rep who will then ask me the same questions again. It makes me wonder exactly where that information went: the computer shouldn’t care what the last four digits of my social security number are; it should realize, from my phone number, that I’m an existing customer, then move me to a human who can solve my problem. (Assuming that somewhere in your company, there actually is one.)
- Teach your customer service reps how to do their jobs. Every time I call when some new wrinkle has developed, it is explained to me that the last person I talked to either didn’t note something correctly or must not understand the process. Naturally, the person I am talking to at that moment does understand the process and is noting everything correctly. Until the next time something goes awry, when the next operator I will talk to will blame this current one for the screw-up. If your employees spent as much time trying to solve a problem as they do trying to pass the buck, there’d be a lot fewer problems for anyone to argue about.
- Review your tapes. If you really do record calls to make sure that I am receiving a positive customer service experience, pull mine and have a listen. You’ll be amazed. You may also be deeply embarrassed and ashamed. And you should be.
- Organize your billing structure. If I’m a DSL customer erroneously billed for a repair that wasn’t performed and for long distance service I don’t even have, I want to call one number to get this straightened out through one helpful employee.I don’t want to get to a DSL billing rep who tells me that I don’t owe DSL a penny, then be transferred to repair billing to get them to take care of that fee (after listening to the whole convoluted story), and then be transferred to long distance billing to get them to remove monthly fees for service I haven’t had for months (after listening to the whole convoluted story). With at least five to ten minutes of sitting on hold between each transfer that only serves to make me more angry for your next employee who has to sit through the same story again. One person should be able to fix everything. Many businesses have such a person, in fact: usually, a customer never encounters them until they tell the automated attendant that they’re ready to cancel their service once and for all. Then suddenly they are transferred to some sort of wizard who can make everything right again with a few quick keystrokes. Put these people at the front end, not the back end. If you do that, you’ll have a lot less people ever reaching the back end.
- Take those diagnostic fees and shove ’em. $85? It would be unreasonable if the tech actually had diagnosed the problem. To bill me such a fee when the tech never even comes inside, but concludes beyond any doubt that this is where the problem must be, is inexcusable. Times may be tough, but they’re tough for your customers, too. Don’t pretend that you’re the only ones scraping for extra money each month. You can afford that $85 a lot easier than I can. And here’s another thought: have enough pride in your product and demonstrate enough concern for your customers that when you conclude something is wrong, fix it. Not for a fee, but to maintain positive customer relations. If a wire goes bad, it’s not because I did anything to cause it. It’s not your fault, either. But even though neither of us wants to pay for it, remember the old adage about the customer always being right: so you be big and pay up. And get the problem fixed.
- Finally, and here’s the big one: You’re a communications company: so communicate. Empower your employees to talk to each other and work together to solve a problem. Make sure everyone understands what’s going on. Make sure everyone understands why things are going on. And stop this “one hand doesn’t know what the other hand is doing” crap. It’s gotten so bad, actually, that it’s more like one finger doesn’t even know what its own fingernail is doing. That ought to disturb you. Immensely.
The next time there’s a problem, I’m just going to have the tech read my blog. Maybe I’ll put them on hold and force them to listen to Muzak for a change.