For the second year in a row, AT&T’s wireless service finds itself at the bottom of the ratings in a customer satisfaction survey done by our cohorts at Consumer Reports.

With good scores from customers on texting and data service satisfaction, Verizon Wireless also repeated as the highest-rated of the four major cell service providers, followed closely by Sprint.

T-Mobile followed behind both those providers but still rated significantly better than AT&T.

“Our survey indicates that subscribers to prepaid and smaller standard-service providers are happiest overall with their cell-phone service,” said Paul Reynolds, electronics editor for Consumer Reports. “However, these carriers aren’t for everyone. Some are only regional, and prepaid carriers tend to offer few or no smart phones.The major carriers are still leading options for many consumers, and we found they ranged widely in how well they satisfied their customers.”

The CR survey questioned more than 66,000 subscribers about their service and customer-support experience with both standard and no-contract providers.

UPDATE: AT&T has released the following statement regarding the CR survey results —

While we’ll of course evaluate and learn from the Consumer Reports survey, we made significant progress in our network in 2011 including a 25 percent improvement in 3G dropped call performance, 48,000 network improvements (more capacity, new cell sites, faster data speeds, and better connections), and many billions of dollars in capital investment to continue to improve our network. Only AT&T’s network lets the iPhone 4S download three times faster and enables simultaneous talk and surf for all smartphones. And, as customer demand continues to skyrocket, our proposed T-Mobile merger will enable AT&T to improve our customers’ experience even more.

AT&T rated lowest (again) in our annual satisfaction survey [Consumer Reports]

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.