Sprint told David that he wouldn’t have to pay an early termination fee. After all, he had moved to a new home, one with no Sprint reception. When he called up Sprint, they assured him that he wouldn’t owe an ETF. He switched to Verizon, and assumed all was well. Now he has a past due balance on that $200 ETF that Sprint representatives totally assured him he wouldn’t have to pay. He took to recording his phone calls. For some reason, no one at Sprint customer service will talk to him after he does that.

Thought I would share the wonderful time I have been having with cancelling my service with Sprint. I moved to a new house that had 0 cell phone service with Sprint. Talk about annoying! Before switching providers, I called Sprint to ask about an Early Termination Fee, and if I would be excluded from it because I moved to an unserviceable area. The answer, was yes, after they looked up the address I gave them seeing it is completely out of range of any towers, as well as no local roaming (confirmed on their address lookup site too). You can probably guess where this is going…

I cancelled back on September 28th and I was required to send proof that I moved to an address not serviceable. On the 28th, when picking up my new Verizon Wireless cell phones, I gave Sprint a copy of my car registration and driver’s license. I was told that is all they need and not to worry (sure thing!). On approximately 10/7 (I think it was that day), I checked my bill and noticed a bill. Funny.. I called in and spoke to somebody who says the fee is legit and it was for my last month service. Great, that was fine. After that conversation, I enabled call recording on office phone at work. On 10/18, I notice another bill for $202. I called in and explained to the Sprint reps they’re being recorded this time so they know. After explaining all this to them AGAIN, and faxing my driver’s license AGAIN, they said no problem, everything will be fine.

Well I call in today because now my account is past due for this ETF I’m not supposed to get. I talk to the first person and again say the call is recorded and ask what’s going on with it? I sent my info and even got the last person recorded saying everything was OK. After back and forth, she transfers me to somebody else. This person tells me I was told to fax in a copy of my driver’s license and that’s why the fee is not gone yet (good thing my fax machine logs my faxes, so I have proof that it arrived just fine). I tell her the call is being recorded and then I’m told I’m not allowed to record calls. I said I most certainly am allowed to record my calls just like Sprint is allowed to record their calls. She says she won’t help me and tried to transfer me. After about 5 minutes she came back saying nobody will help me if I’m recording my calls. Most likely because they do not want to be caught in a recording confirming everything is good.

We sent David along to the Sprint Consumerist Hotline. At first, there was a glimmer of hope. David wrote back to us:

The person that answered the phone was very nice and extremely helpful! One of the original people I spoke to put a note on my account on the 18th saying she had my information, but never did anything after that. After corporate speaks to her, I am supposed to get a phonecall back tomorrow about where this stands. Thank you for that direct line! Did not even have to wade through prompts!

Then “tomorrow” came. Well, two weeks passed.

I was told collections would be frozen and they would clear my account, then I have to send back 2 phones. They sent the shipping materials to my old address, instead of my new address, even after getting a copy of my license and everything else. Now today, I get [an email saying that Sprint is sending me to an outside collection agency.]

The person I spoke to that called me back via the number you gave me really had me fooled for a while. I really thought this would get taken care of. I’ve also tried the carpet bomb, but just got the same guy contacting me with no real progress as you can probably tell.

All of our contacts lead David right back to the same executive customer service ninja team. Let’s hope that mail forwarding works its magic and David gets those shipping materials. Sure, he could mail the phones back himself, but with his luck they won’t show up in Sprint’s system unless he uses their specific label.

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