Consumerist reader Thomas has been an AT&T U-Verse customer for about four years and says that whenever there has been a problem, the service techs have been prompt and friendly. But then he decided to make the mistake of moving to a new house only a few miles away, and now he’s trapped in the customer service Death Star.

Thomas tells Consumerist that since he first tried to notify AT&T about the move “they have been pretty much impossible work with.”

“Even though I preface every conversation with, ‘This is a brand new house so it’s not on a map but your box is literally in my front yard,’ they say, ‘Well we can not find your address on a map so we can not send someone out to set it up.'”

He says he points out that the people on the next block over, which is on the AT&T map, has U-Verse service and the AT&T CSRs agree.

“I explain that is the same neighborhood and all they have to do is send a guy out there and we will be good to go,” he tells Consumerist. But, Thomas says all he gets in response is “Umm, nope sorry. We can not send someone out there.”

So if AT&T can’t help him out because his house isn’t on the map yet, certainly no one else can, right?

Except that Thomas says it only took five minutes on the phone with Time Warner Cable to say they could send someone out to hook his house up.

Even more interesting, when Thomas called Direct TV, they said, “No problem, we can even provide Internet services though AT&T.”

“I ask how they can do that when AT&T says that can’t,” he recalls. “They say oh no problem we will take care of that.”

Meanwhile, Thomas estimates he’s spent five fruitless hours on the phone with AT&T trying to simply keep the service he’s had for the last four years.

He wants to know from the Consumerist hive mind (patent pending) if he should just dump AT&T and go with a competitor who can find his house, or if anyone else has been through this hassle with an unmapped address and has any advice for him.

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