We asked our leak what Sprint thought when The Consumerist posted back in October about how customers could escape their cellphone contract without penalty, based on the raise in text-message rates.

benpopken: What does Sprint think of our “how to cancel without ETF posts” ?
philip: The honest truth? We laugh. Or rather, they.
benpopken: Why do they laugh?
philip: Here’s the thing…

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philip: Specialists are trained from day one that absolutely under no circumstances can the ETFs be waived for anything other than death (and obviously this one is subjective).
philip: So… The company failed to communicate we were ethically obligated to allow customers out of their contract.
benpopken: not to mention legally
philip: …The change took effect at the beginning of October and it opened a 30 day window from the time you got your bill to cancel. Specialists weren’t informed that it could be done until 10/17… Half our customer base had already been told no and they were not allowed to get out after they had already made a payment.
benpopken: Yeah people were having some troubles with that one
philip: Customer Care is always the last to be told.

This also certainly puts Cingular’s intransigence in the face of customers trying to legitimately exit contract in a very interesting light. It means that somewhere along the line, someone inside Cingular actively decided they should flout standard contract law, just because it made them more money. Not like we didn’t know this already. — BEN POPKEN

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