SMS rates going up! [TmoNews] (Thanks to Arnaldo!)

(Photo: scentzilla)

Days left | fee

180: $200
180-91: $100
90-30: $50
29-1: $50 or monthly rate, whichever is less.

Glad to see another carrier joining in with declining ETFs. It's that much closer to doing away with them entirely. No word yet on whether this will only apply to new customers.

Here's the text of Tmobile's email announcement.

Beginning on June 28, 2008, the ETF for customers who choose a one-year or two-year service agreement with T-Mobile will decline during the course their contract. The ETF decreases from $200 to $100 if customers terminate service with 91 to 180 days remaining on their agreement; and decreases again to $50 with fewer than 91 days remaining. If customers terminate in the last 30 days of their term, the ETF is $50 or their standard monthly charge, whichever is less.

T-Mobile Eases Early Termination Fees [Washington Post]

(Thanks to Spencer!)

(Photo: shlomp-a-plompa)

Another rendering of the life you will never lead.

Vitals:

• 640 stones of 3251 carats of Swarovski crystals
• 2.6-inch touch screen with QVGA resolution
• 2-megapixel camera
• ringtones (possibly with Dior's voice himself)
• USB-sized miniature "My Dior" auxiliary cellphone

New Dior Phone Targets China, Russia [WSJ]
"My Dior" Mobile Phone [Luxist]
Swarovski Dior Phone Inlaid with 640 Crystals, Costs $26,000 [Mobiledia]

AT&T settles suit over 3rd-party cell phone fees [AP via MrConsumer]
(Photo: Getty)

Jay Ellison (COO and Executive VP) - jay.ellison@uscellular.com
Matthew Rull (Head of President's Office for Customer Service) - matthew.rull@uscellular.com

Jennifer Bachus
Executive Customer Relations Coordinator
877-290-6323, Ex. 341-8083

Don't forget this refresher course on how to act when you call executive customer service.

(Thanks to John!)
(Photo: shlomp-a-plompa)

ArsTechnica writer Nate Anderson was a recent "cramming" victim, and he wrote about his experience tracking down who was behind it. Cramming is a scam where third-party groups tell your phone company to bill you for "services," services you never signed up for, and the phone company happily obliges, taking a cut of the fee. The phone company does no verification and all the scammer needs is your phone number. In Nate's case, he was signed up for three different voicemail services and email-forwarding service, three at $14.95 per month, and one at $12.95, doubling his telephone bill. Snooping around, he found the companies behind it were ILD and ESBI, and scores of cramming complaints about these "companies" littered the internet. Luckily he was able to get refunds without difficulty (crammers often make it easy to cancel so you don't go complaining to any law enforcement bodies) only providing just as much information as these con-artists used to flimflam him in the first place: his phone number. So how can you fight a crammer?

1. Watch your bills for suspicious charges.
2. If you see a fee for a service you never ordered, contact the "service" provider and request a refund.
3. Ask your phone company about how to remove erroneous charges.
4. File an FTC complaint.
5. After you get your money back, ask your phone company to put a block against third-party charges on your account.

Cram this: a firsthand account of my recent cramming [Ars Technica] (Thanks to John!)

(Photo: Getty)

Rick Fields
910-794-6244

Lisa Jackson
910-794-6242

Korlene Baker
910-794-6233

Lisa Williams
910-794-6232

Verizon Wireless executive customer service desk: 845-365-7700, 908-306-6750, 910-794-6200

Dan Malutith (Supervisor of Exec Relations)
910-794-7372

(Photo: Getty)

AT&T Launches Pro-Rated ETF System [Broadband Reports]
(Photo: mrbill)

In exchange for amnesty from a series of potentially billions of dollars in class action lawsuits over early termination fees (ETFs), the cellphone companies have proposed some namby-pamby ETF reforms to the FCC. Their ideas:

• Pro-rating early termination fees, so the cancellation fee goes down every month
• Customers can cancel without ETF up to 30 days after singing contract, or 10 days after receiving their first bill
• The overall fee would be slightly reduced

Cellphone companies main justification for early termination fees is that they have to recover the costs of selling cellphones at a discounted rate. True, but why then do I get charged an ETF if even if my cellphone was bought off eBay?

A cellphone manufacturer may charge the cellphone company $500+ per phone, but does it have to? Has anyone looked at whether the price reflects the real production cost? I'm not just making an argument here, I really am curious. Whether this model came about by malicious design or fortuity, the result is legal way to prevent consumers from exercising consumer choice and punishing companies for poor service. Early termination fees are the only reason why the entire cellphone service industry gets away with having below average customer satisfaction scores.

Proposal may ease cancellation fees for cell phone users [AP] (Thanks to Tom!)

(Photo: R80o (Mark Strozier))

Sprint is NOW LIMITING DATA USAGE - 5GB - just like the rest... [Sprint Users] (Thanks to everyone who sent this in!)

Consumers report receiving automated message calls from a service calling itself "The Jobline" where you're told they have jobs for you if you call back, but it turns out it's just a scam. If you call the number back, you will get charged $9 per minute, according to messages left in online forums where people share information on telemarketing numbers. They seem to be using the number 976-4477 in different area codes. A scam targeting people already hard up for work and money, that's pretty high on the Richter scale of sleaziness.

773-976-4477 [800notes] (Thanks to Skurry!)

(Photo: Getty)

Well the AT&T refusing to sell a go-phone isn't a isolated incident. I go in. Me: "Ya, can I get the CG180 go phone?" First Guy: "Just the phone, No SIM?" Me: "Ya."

waiting....

First Guy:"What's your current AT&T phone number?"
Me: Like an idiot I tell him.
First Guy to Shift Supervisor: "Can he buy this?"
Shift supervisor:"Sorry sir you can't buy this phone your not a go-phone customer."
Me: "Well...maybe I want to be one now, can't I just buy the phone?
Shift Supervisor:" Well if you want, but you have to buy 100 dollars worth of credit with it."
Me: "It doesn't say that anywhere in the store, isn't that why its called pay as you go?"
Shift Supervisor: "New Go-Phone customers don't need to, but since you already have an AT&T account you have to."
(The account isn't even in my name. Its in my mom's.)
Me: "Well, let me get this straight. if i came in and didn't tell you I was an AT&T customer I could get it?"
Shift Supervisor: "Yes, but you are, so you can't. But you can buy a better phone for a little bit more, as long as you do it as a qualified upgrade."
Me: "No...I want this phone. my friend has it and I really like it."
Shift Supervisor: "Well you would have to buy it at Radio Shack or Best Buy, corporate stores don't do it."
Me: "But isn't the online the same as the corporate stores? I can buy one on there."
shift Supervisor: "I suppose you could."
Me: "Fine...I will."

Leave

What a bunch of BS. I called AT&T because I was that pissed and asked. They said "the shift supervisor must have been misinformed about policy, she should have sold you the phone."

Store was 6th ave in NYC

-Dan

(photo:dabby1)

KarmaChameleon wrote:

The way most systems in call centers are set up, you can't have multiple screens open to view info, so writing things down is a necessity if you don't want to have to keep clicking back and forth between workflows. I can't imagine the nightmare it would have been working at Chase and not being able to write things down when working accounts.

PREVIOUSLY: Tmobile Forbids Use Of Paper and Pens In Call Center
(Photo: Getty)

Joseph would like to cancel his Verizon contract without early termination fee by arguing that the recent monthly administrative fee increase is materially adverse, but unfortunately for Joseph, Verizon's lawyers have filled their customer service reps brains with a bunch of hooey about what materially adverse means. In fact, when Joseph was reading the very clause in the Verizon contract that allows him to what he wants, the call center supervisor laughed at him. According to his account, when he criticized the poor customer service, she started screaming at him. The text of Joe's attempted EECB, inside...

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I would like to inform you of an issue I am having with your customer service department. Today, 5/7/08, I tried to contact customer service around 5 PM. Unfortunately, every time I was transferred to the department I requested, I received the message "We cannot process your call at this time. . ." and then was disconnected.

I finally reached customer retention nearly an hour later. Among my many calls, of note, I spoke with Stephanie (ext. 7476) and Trish (ext. 7129) at the Cranberry, PA call center. When I informed these CSR's that I wanted my ETF waived due to the increase in the monthly administration fee being materially adverse, I was put on hold between 5-10 minutes EACH call, presumably so that the CSR could find a way to reject my request. (Although I want to close my account, I want to port my number to another carrier, so I cannot have my account closed before the number is ported).

Both calls escalated to the floor supervisor (once at my request, the other to "confirm that [she] could complete my request." Both calls were escalated to Danielle (ext. 4075, also at Cranberry, PA). This "Danielle" denied my request to have my ETF waived. During the first call, she was relatively professional, granting my request for an escalation contact number/address. However, when I criticized the poor customer service, she began screaming at me. During the second call, she laughed at me when I read the following clause from the contract:

Our Rights to Make Changes

Your service is subject to our business policies, practices and procedures, which we can change without notice. UNLESS OTHERWISE PROHIBITED BY LAW, WE CAN ALSO CHANGE PRICES AND ANY OTHER CONDITIONS IN THIS AGREEMENT AT ANY TIME BY SENDING YOU WRITTEN NOTICE PRIOR TO THE BILLING PERIOD IN WHICH THE CHANGES WOULD GO INTO EFFECT. IF YOU CHOOSE TO USE YOUR SERVICE AFTER THAT POINT, YOU'RE ACCEPTING THE CHANGES. IF THE CHANGES HAVE A MATERIAL ADVERSE EFFECT ON YOU, HOWEVER, YOU CAN END THE AFFECTED SERVICE, WITHOUT ANY EARLY TERMINATION FEE, JUST BY CALLING US WITHIN 60 DAYS AFTER WE SEND NOTICE OF THE CHANGE.

She then said that the 15c per month charge wasn't materially adverse. I explained to her that the phrase "material(ly) adverse" has no quantifiable limit; one definition is: "of such a nature that knowledge of the item would affect a person's decision-making process." In the canon of law, (any) price is considered as having this nature.

I am hoping that one of you fine people may be able to assist me with this issue. My account information is:

Name: Joseph XXXXX
Phone#: XXXXXXXXXX
Account#: XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Please contact me to discuss this further. I would greatly welcome an effort to restore my opinion of your company. Thank you for your time in consideration in getting this matter resolved.

Sincerely,

Joseph C. Tkocs

If the EECB doesn't work out, Joe, you can also try some of these phone numbers.

An insider reports that a Tmobile call center has outlawed customer service reps having pens and paper out in the open. According to our source, the outsourced Business Care facility in Sarnia, Ontario is concerned about reps making off with data. Pens, paper, pencils are not to be left out on the work areas. If they are used, they must be put back inside the desk and locked after use. This has "made life considerably less pleasant for them...There are a number of reps who write faster than they type, so they use a notepad as a sort of buffer." Even photographs and other paper items on cubicle walls will have to be laminated to insure they're not used as illegal writing surfaces. The tipster says Startek-run call center is conducting an audit today to insure compliance with all of its new, policies. It's a good thing that no one working at Tmobile might have access to a small electronic device capable of data input and transmission.

(Photo: Getty)

Here's a bunch of contact info for Qwest executives, lifted straight from their company directory. Got an issue with a residential landline or DSL? Problem with Qwest iQ Networking products? Concern about Qwest business related network support? Concern about Qwest marketing? Need to know who to send a lawsuit? Just need to get a message straight to the CEO? Inside, executive contacts for all of the above.

Issues related to residential dial tone lines (POTS) or DSL sales/installation:

Kruger, Paula
Executive Vice President-Mass Markets
Mass Markets
Qwest Corporation
1801 California St, 52nd Floor
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
paula.kruger@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 992 4005
Fax: +1 303 296 4252
Assistant
Williams, Cheryl A
Sr Executive Admin Assistant
+1 303 992 4001

Concerns regarding installation, order delays, or activation/turnup issues related to Qwest iQ Networking products (such as the popular Qwest Office Connect product):

Coon, Christina L
Vice President-Network Ops and Eng
Network Services
Qwest Communication Corp.
1801 California St, Floor 51
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
Christina.Coon@qwest.com
Assistant
Anthony, Diane M
Sr Executive Admin Assistant
+1 303 992 5949
Office: +1 303 992 6565
Fax: +1 303 296 4798

Concerns regarding any Qwest business-related network support (DS1, DS3, Ethernet services, trouble and repair, etc.)

Lucero, Amador B
Vice President - Network Ops and Eng
Network Services
Qwest Corporation
700 W Mineral Ave, MNA1622
Littleton CO 80120-0000
United States
Amador.Lucero@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 707 7168
Fax: +1 303 707 2005
Assistant
Rojo, Jaimee B
Sr Administrative Assistant
+1 303 707 7192

Tregemba, Robert (Bob) D
Executive Vice President - Network Operations
Network Services
Qwest Corporation
1801 California St, 5200
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
Bob.Tregemba@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 707 8000
Fax: +1 303 296 0286
Assistant
Eitel, Carolyn J
Sr Executive Admin Assistant
+1 303 707 8013

Concerns regarding Qwest marketing, possible PR contact:

Karlis, Richard
Director Marketing
Corporate Relations
Qwest Corporation
1801 California St, 50th Floor
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
rich.karlis@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 896 4465
Fax: +1 303 896 4982

Another possible PR contact:

Padilla, Frederic (Ric)
VP-Corp Social Responsibility
Corporate Relations
Qwest Corporation
1801 California St, 50th Floor
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
Ric.Padilla@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 896 9338
Fax: +1 303 896 4982
Assistant
Barbour, Debra (Debbie) J
Executive Admin Assistant
+1 303 896 5532

Legal contact (good to serve a lawsuit to):

Baer, Richard N
EVP-Gen Counsel
Legal
Qwest Corporation
1801 California St, 5200
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
Rich.Baer@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 992 2811
Assistant
Dominguez, Christine
Sr Executive Admin Assistant
+1 303 992 5021

Self-explanatory:

Mueller, Edward (Ed) A
Chairman and CEO
Ceo/Coo
Qwest Corporation
1801 California St
Denver CO 80202-2658
United States
Ed.Mueller@qwest.com
Office: +1 303 992 1414
Assistant
Houston, Brenda L
Manager Administration
+1 303 992 1414

RELATED: Email Addresses For Qwest Executives

(Photo: romulusnr)

In 4 1/2 minutes I had both my phone numbers canceled and ready to port to ATT with the ETF waived on both lines. No escalation, no deep explaining, no pain really! I told the CSR that she was very pleasant to work with and thanked her for her help with this matter. She proceeded to thank me as well and told me that I was pleasant as well, and that most that have called that she has talked to, were "Abrubt and sometimes rude" when calling about the "Opt-Out".

The moral of the story. No matter what you're dealing with, treat others the way you want to be treated. If you're nice to a CSR, they will be nice back and work hard to help you. I've been with Verizon 6 years and have had only one problem with their customer service. But even then, it doesn't matter what Customer Service department I talk to, no matter how rude "they" may be, I still can get good service by being friendly, personable, and kind to them.

Alicia wants to escape her Verizon contract without paying an early termination fee, but she's having some trouble. She writes:

Just today, I was informed that Verizon is now increasing their monthly administration charge. I have a right to cancel with having the early termination fee waived because of this increase. The Verizon supervisors I spoke to (total of 4 people) refused to follow this clause and would not waive the early termination fee even though Verizon changed the fees. They said they would give me a credit for this increase, so then it would not adversely affect me, so I can't have the ETF waived. I made it clear that I had a right to cancel and have the ETF waived regardless of what credit they would be willing to give me. They said that having the ETF waived is not an option and they can not do that. Am I in the wrong?

Hi Alicia,

You just keep on refusing that fee waiver. The fee increase still has a material adverse effect, even if they give you a credit to cover it. If someone breaks your arm and puts it in a cast for you, they still broke your arm.

I purchased a new Motorola RAZR V3XX in March 2008. It has a small plastic flap that covers the charger port and is held in place by two hair-thin plastic hinges. I assume the cover is to keep dust, pocket lint, facial hair, and tirade-driven spurts of saliva from entering the port.

Every time the phone is charged or the headset is used, this flap is flipped open. Clearly, this is a very frail part that was doomed from the beginning to wear out and break off through normal use. In fact, it is not even possible to avoid excess use, since the flap cannot be left in the open position.

As I anticipated, three months after I bought the phone, the flap failed. I wrote to Motorola through their website, and a helpful customer service rep named Brock O. immediately responded that he will send me a replacement. Days later, the part arrived and I snapped it into place. Problem solved. Helpful rep, simple solution, happy customer.

Well, eight months later, this replacement piece also failed and I again requested a replacement from Motorola. This time, a less helpful rep named Sebastian B. suggested I contact a service center to have the phone repaired. Quote: "With this option, they may be able to send the unit to us directly and sometimes they will provide you with a loaner phone to use in the interim. They also may be able to order the parts and or make adjustments locally."

I wrote back and included the dialogue from the previous incident, explaining how Brock O had been so helpful and sent me the part, so I could just snap it on myself. It seemed that shipping a phone for repair by a technician, requiring an 8-10 day turnaround seemed overkill.

The rep responded: "Regarding your concern, we are really sorry to tell you that no charging port covers are available to order or send. Because the charging port cover is attached within the housing of the phone, the phone must come in to repair center to have that part replaced by technicians."

Also for the second time, they warned me that, "Motorola stands behind our products by offering a minimum one-year warranty issued from the date of purchase. This warranty does not cover physical or liquid damage." This accusatory message was sent to me twice, despite me being asked in a previous email if there was any water or physical damage and the confirmation that I was within my one year warranty period. I explained that clearly this is a common wear item that fails from normal use. I was pretty sure the hinges didn't wear out from water damage?

Once again, a new rep, Eduardo, told me to send it to the service center. I checked their link for all service centers within 500 miles and found only one in New York City. NYC is a 60 mile round trip for me, $8 tolls, $30 to park, and the service center says there is a charge for service. When I spoke to them, they told me that they do not stock the part and the phones they see are always missing it anyway.

So, to wrap up our situation here, my phone, still under warranty, has a repeatedly failing part that wears out during normal usage. While this was easily replaced in the past, I am now told that Motorola no longer stock replacement parts, which seems strange since it is a current model and still under warranty. The service center they referred me to does not stock the part and would cost me a significant amount of money for them to even look at it.

1. If charging port covers are NOT available, how can a technician replace it for me?

2. If the technicians DO stock the port cover, how come they cannot simply mail one to me?

3. Since I have already replaced this part with no problem, why do they insist that I require a technician to do it? It simply snaps into a hole on the phone. No tools, no expertise, no opening of the top-secret housing, no voiding warranty.

Bottom line. My phone is a current model, it is still under warranty and has a repeatedly failing part that Motorola will not fix despite their obligation to do so. Anybody know the URL for Nokia?

(Photo: bryanbope)

After calling The Consumerist Sprint Executive Customer Service number (703-433-4401), it turns out that Sprint misprinted the bill for lots of people, accidentally moving the decimal two places to the right. The error has now been fixed and Jessie only owes $326.69. "One question remains though," asks Jessie, "will debt collectors be knocking at my door for this mistake?"

I could not find a way to contact AOL to stop my service. So I took a yellow marker, drew a line though that line item on my credit card bill, and wrote on the bill...."Do not pay, account in dispute". I paid all the other items on the CC bill that month. It took AOL about 2 weeks to call me.....I told them what I thought of their service, and instructed them to terminate my account, while I was still on the phone. It worked. They seem to understand when you tell them you are not going to pay.

• Motorola RAZR V3xx Platinum Phone - make $49.99 after rebate
• Nokia 2610 Phone - make $149.99 after rebate
• LG CU575 - make $24.99 after rebate
• Nokia 6085 - make $124.99 after rebate
• Nokia 6126 Phone - make $99.99 after rebate

• There's also some restrictions to make sure you're not gaming the system:

The Price listed above for this phone includes an instant $250 discount from Amazon.com. You agree to repay this $250 discount to Amazon.com if, during the six-month period following the activation date or renewal date of your existing contract, you:
(1) fail to pay your balance due each month on time;
(2) fail to maintain your account in good standing;
(3) disconnect the line of service;
(4) transfer the phone to another line of service;
(5) change your service rate plan, including canceling or removing required PDA, BlackBerry, or smartphone features after your product has shipped; or
(6) use this line of service to replace an existing account with the carrier. The discount is available only if you are activating a new non-substitute line of service or extending an existing line of service. If you do not follow these rules, you authorize Amazon.com to charge your credit card $250 as reimbursement of the discount without need for further approval. Third-party resellers are prohibited from purchasing cell phones on behalf of customers. **Purchase limit five (5) cell phones per household.**

Amazon AT&T Phone Sale

(Photo: Maulleigh)

(Photo: Getty)

Workers Picket Verizon Again Over Customer Service [Tampa Bay Online] (Thanks to Jefro!)
(Photo: Getty)

BillShrink [via Lifehacker]

1) Members of the Howards Forums cellphone message boards have discovered a URL hack that lets users add the "Unlimited Shared Night & Weekend Minutes at 5pm pack" for free to their account.

2) If you take this URL and replace the phone# at the end with the phone number of someone who hasn't set up the PIN on their account, you will see the last 4 digits of their social security number. Not a huge deal, we give out the last 4 of our social over the phone all the time, but it seems a bit odd to broadcast these numbers unnecessarily.

PREVIOUSLY: Flawed Sprint Security Worse Than We Thought
Flawed Security Lets Sprint Accounts Get Easily Hijacked

From TechCrunch:

We've noted problems with the service in the past, but never a general outage. The site is down. The service is down. Everything appears to be offline.

If you want to be a phone company, and get your users to rely on you to manage all of your incoming calls, this simply cannot happen.

Google has yet to release a statement or give any indication when GrandCentral will be back up and running—though it better be soon. Google's starting to make Verizon look good, and that's simply intolerable.

If You Wanna Be A Phone Company, You Can't Go Dead [TechCrunch]

Customer service has been no help, so Matt emailed people at the executive level. Although several addresses bounced back the message, Matt did receive a promise that Qwest's executive VP that someone from customer service would contact him to resolve the matter. That was on March 31st, and he still hasn't heard back from anyone.

Here's the email Matt sent to the Qwest bigwigs:

Dear Teresa Taylor,
 
My name is Matt [redacted] and I am writing to you on behalf of my mother, [redacted]. Recently, she was the victim of some very bad customer service, of which I wanted to make you aware. My mother was satisfied with her service, but when she attempted to add a long distance plan to her decades-old account, adding to Qwest's bottom line, she was bumped off her plan, signed up for a two year contract without her knowledge, presented with false claims that she would save money, asked to pay an additional $60, and prevented from using the service for which she paid, for approximately a week at the time of writing.
 
My mother has had the same phone service for over three decades, including Qwest and your predecessors in the area, at the phone number [uh-oh redacted as well]. She has had DSL internet with Qwest for approximately 8 years, signing up for a 256 kbps line with an internal DSL modem. Her bill in February for these two services totaled approximately $63. For most of this time, she has been very satisfied, except for the times when her connection would be unavailable for days or weeks at a time. Tech support representatives were often completely unhelpful, despite keeping her on the phone for hours. On one occasion, over a three-day weekend, she had to wait three and a half days to have someone reset her password after she had forgotten it and accidentally erased it from her computer.
 
Recently, she made a phone call to Qwest to try to sign up for a long distance plan to replace her plan with AT&T. This should have been a simple call to add a relatively inexpensive service, but she was given a hard sell to change her plan. She was told that she could save $11 by switching to a bundle that would include phone and internet service at 1.5 mbps, and an additional discount for bundling her phone, internet, and DirecTV service. The operator failed to mention that she would be signing a two year contract with Qwest as part of the Price for Life program, the new bill for phone and internet would total approximately $66, she would be ineligible for the new DirecTV equipment that new customers receive, and that the service would fail to work with her current modem, requiring her to buy or rent a new one. Soon after, she was unable to use her internet and approximately a week passed before the issue was resolved when my mother and I spoke with someone in the sales department.
 
When I called into Qwest and had an opportunity to speak with a salesperson about the problem, she was the first person we found remotely helpful and was able to find the tech support operator, "Roger," who finally discovered the problem. It was at this point that the representative told us that my mother would have to pay $60 for a modem or pay $5 a month to rent the moment. She had the audacity to claim that my mother would still be saving $6 if she paid $5 every month in perpetuity for the modem, despite the fact that a $5 increase would bring the cost to $71, which would be $8 more than she paid on her February bill. My mother could receive credit for the time her internet was down before the source of the problem was found, but if she did not choose to take advantage of the offer to send a modem, she would have to keep paying for unusable internet.
 
I asked to have my mother's plan revert back to her original plan and after a long time spent on hold, I was told that this would not be possible as the plan was no longer offered. I asked to at least have the Price for Life contract removed and she was eventually able to do this after another period on hold. A supervisor offered to have the modem sent overnight with no additional shipping costs, but we were told that we would still have to pay for the modem. The operator gave us her personal work email to us so that we could contact her with further questions, which was a nice gesture, and my mother and I ended the call.
 
Although I am happy that we eventually discovered what had happened to bring my mother's internet down, we are both completely unsatisfied with the proposed resolution and the road which brought us here. As I said in the first paragraph of this letter, my mother had been satisfied with her service, but when she attempted to add a long distance plan to her decades-old account, adding to Qwest's bottom line, she was bumped off her plan, signed up for a two year contract without her knowledge, presented with false claims that she would save money, asked to pay an additional $60, and prevented from using the service for which she paid, for approximately a week.
 
We ask that you instead consent to a resolution which we believe is fair, where my mother receives local phone service, DSL internet at 1.5 Mbps, and a free modem that will make the service usable, at the same price she was already paying, as well as a free upgrade to new DirecTV equipment, discounts for bundling her current DirecTV with her phone and internet, and credit for the time she has been unable to use her internet service. We believe that the upgrade to 1.5 Mbps and new DirecTV equipment is fair for a long time customer whom has happily put up with so much frustration for years, and will prevent future confusion with tech support operators who have been unfamiliar with her current modem and TV equipment. This will also allow Qwest to stop maintaining an outdated line. If you wish to propose an alternative, please let us know. My mother is already looking at prices for competitors and working on a letter to Consumerist.com, the Better Business Bureau, and the Iowa Attorney General, so we ask that you respond to this message promptly or by April 4th at 5:00 pm at this address.
 
Thank you for your time, and your attention to this matter.

"Verizon is not letting us do our jobs, and not letting us take care of the customer," said Doug Sellers, president of the union that represents Verizon call center and repair workers, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 824. "Customers are waiting up to 10 days to get their phone lines fixed ... If you have something as simple as static on your line, that could be out 10 to 15 days.

Union Protests Verizon's Neglect Of Copper: Focusing resources on FiOS comes with a cost [DSL Reports]
(Photo: Getty)