Bait and Switch
Unfortunately, my actual review is about the whole company and not Just the store. To start, I saw the promotions on TV and decide to check out the website before going into the store. I got a pretty good idea of the plan and deals online and decide to go to the store and check it all out. I've been an AT&T customer for quite some years now and T-Mobile has been really selling this come over plan to T-Mobile with all the goodies. Military discount, Netflix, pick your phone, etc.
I arrived into the store and was greeted with some really friendly people and felt they were genuinely nice overall. We could not get the deal I was being offered online so I ultimately decided to go back online and try the deals there because the amount the store was telling me versus what I was told online were not quite aligned. This will be one of my complaints later as you will see. So after returning to the website and chatting it up with someone on there, I had to call-in and finalize the deal on the phone a few days later. Now up to this point I have not had any major issue other than a faulty payment process online and inconsistent information between store and website. I received my package in a short period of time and was rather pleased with the speed of everything. I had decided to get these as Christmas gifts and so they would sit under the tree for a few days now until the big day. For my son's line however, I had to actually give him his earlier than Christmas because he's a teenager without a phone. If you're a parent, you know 10 days without a line wasn't to going to work.
Now because he decided to join my line from his mothers plan and needed his phone before Christmas, I hesitated to get my line during this transition because I just paid my bill with AT&T and since these things were going to sit under a tree for a few days I could just order mine later. I was reassured by the phone sales person my limit was fine to add my line and I could do it later as I intended. Fast forward to today and like most of you (maybe) finally I can focus on Christmas shopping because the work week usually has most of my attention.
I went into a different T-Mobile because I was shopping in a different area, and I was told I could not get a phone because the limit financed had been reached. I asked the person to check again and they said the same thing. No biggie, this would not be the first time the store and online/phone sales team were not aligned as I mentioned earlier so I guess I will have to do as I did before, call in. Unfortunately because it is the holiday season, the wait time was over an hour. My son and I drove to other locations for non related shopping in general and just decided to leave the phone on hold in the background. After only about 20 min, we decided to call-it "hang up" and continue with our day.
Now we get into the real disappointing stuff. I got ahold of customer service early in the morning and had to escalate my call to some supervisor after the initial person said the same thing as the store rep. "Oh so now you're on the same page right." Here is my beef, I made the decision to come over from AT&T because they not only had some nice deals, but it was directly aligned with what I needed. A little time to figure out what my son was going decide his XR or XS Max and just add the line when we got closer to Christmas. Of course keeping in mind I was financed for a higher amount initially when I called in. Now the representative says "I can no longer get the deal you want because our records show you have reached the limit of your financing" unless of course you pay for this phone you are requesting "XR". I asked the representative to please check the recorded conversation because I asked specifically about this and was told something different. Checking with his processes and after a short hold, the answer was still the same, NO BUENO. I asked him, what can be done? Who do we need to talk to to check into this because I feel your company was quick to deal initially and now is going back on what we discussed. He came back and said my other option would be, send the phones back, cancel the line, and re apply in three months. Can you believe this? Send back and re-apply in three months. They're wrapped and under the tree. WOW! this is a classic bait and switch moment if I have ever been in one. Apparently, no one has the ability to acess the phone conversation where this was discussed, but they are willing to just say this is our policy and we can do nothing for you.
I close with this, AT&T may be a hell of alot more expensive, but their message and consistency has been stead fast for all the years we have been there. I don't know what I'm going to do but I really believe I am going to pull those gifts from under the tree and send them their stuff back one day before Christmas eve because they "T-Mobile" know they've got you by the short hairs. read more
