Sprint has a new CEO, and, you know, it’s a tough job being “the new guy” and being charged with turning around a poorly performing company. So we thought we’d give Dan Hesse a hand and tell him what’s wrong with their phone-based customer service, seen as being one of their major weaknesses. We asked our readers for their thoughts and they had lots of neat ideas why Sprint customer service sucks. Some of them even have worked on the call center side of Sprint; their insights are especially revealing/frightening…
cellphones
AT&T Doesn't Work In Area It Advertises
By 12.19.07
AT&T has a new campaign advertises how it “works in more places like,” and then lists a fictional place that’s a mashup of three cities. The ads are appearing in the tunnels and trains of Washington DC Metro, a real place, where AT&T really doesn’t work. Only Verizon works down there. Commenter XianZomby writes, “I think before ATT works on getting their wireless network in places that don’t exist, they should focus on getting their cell phones to work in places where they advertise cell phone service.”
Sprint Fixes Only 53% Of Problems On First Call
By 12.18.07
Sprint customer service reps can only fix 53% of of customer problems on the first call, according to an internal company document viewed by the WSJ. In contrast, T-Mobile has a 71% first-call fix rate, despite Sprint having nearly triple the amount of CSRs. That is really bad. Why is Sprint’s customer service so bad? Do they just hire incompetent people? Are they too focused on metrics, where the most important thing is that they spend the least amount of time on a call as possible? Are the reps underpaid? What, oh, what, is at the root of this customer service conundrum?
Sprint Names New CEO
By 12.18.07
Sprint named Dan Hesse as its new CEO, replacing Gary Forsee who was effectively fired in October. Dan used to be the CEO of Embarq, which was formerly Sprint’s local telephone division. 1997-200 he was the CEO of AT&T wireless for 3 years and worked there for a total of 23 years. He left that job to join a Seattle tech startup,Terabeam, which made free-space optical transceivers for Internet access in city downtowns. So the dude is has got some chops. Will his combination of experience and innovation be just what Sprint needs to staunch its subscriber base hemorrhaging? According to this Bloomberg article, Hesse helped slow profit bleeding at Embarq by closing call centers and creating service packages. In Sprint’s case, however, he needs to open more call centers. We shall see.
Tmobile Executive Resolutions Fax Number
By 12.17.07
If regular Tmobile customer service fails ya, you could always try faxing their executive resolution team. It might do you as much good as faxing the local Chinese store, but hey, it pays to dream.
Tmobile: Pay $239 For Calls You Didn't Make To Africa
By 12.17.07
Mike had his phone stolen and $239 in fraudulent calls made to Africa on November 4th, and even though he reported the charges on November 5th, Tmobile says he still has to pay up. Their inviolable policy is that you’re responsible for the charges up until you report the phone as stolen. Mike recorded his failed attempts to get Tmobile to credit his account.
By 12.13.07
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Mention coupon code MORE4U on your next Sprint phone purchase and get $25 off.
Sprint Mails Customers A "Get Out Of Sprint Free" Card
By 12.12.07
Sprint has mailed postcards to its customers saying that, beginning January 1st, it will stop charging so-called “recovery” fees and create new fees to replace (or possibly exceed) them. Sprint customers are now asking themselves whether or not this is a change to the Terms & Conditions—if so, then they should be able to cancel their contracts without paying an ETF, or early termination fee.
AT&T Overcharging For Sending Pictures?
By 12.7.07
If you’re AT&T cellphone customer on a messaging plan and you like to send pictures, check your bills. After noticing he was getting overcharged for sending pictures, reader Robert says an AT&T CSR told him that AT&T is having a nationwide computer glitch that could be overcharging you too…
AT&T To GoPhone User: "You Don't Have A Contract With Us And We Don't Have To Provide Service"
By 12.7.07
Reader Christian has an iPhone that is activated on a pre-paid GoPhone plan with AT&T. The EDGE service has stopped working properly for quite a few GoPhone-style iPhone users in California and Christian isn’t having much luck with AT&T’s customer service:
By 12.5.07
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A reader reports that Tmobile customers can access their accounts again over the phone and internet again. Previously, the giant West Coast storm had knocked the system out of commission.
Cellphones Could Replace Boarding Passes
By 12.5.07
You might be able to board flights using just your cellphone, if a three-month test program by Continental Airlines at Houston International Airport is successful. Under the proposed system, a special code, in a mass of black and white boxes, gets sent to your cellphone or PDA. At the gate, the airline scans it with a barcode reader. You must still show photo ID. Air Canada has been using it since September and says the number of people using it has doubled every week since inception. Imagine that, a new security procedure that is both more secure, and more convenient. Just hope your batteries don’t run out.
Severe Flooding In The Northwest Knocks Out T-Mobile's Customer Service
By 12.4.07
Hey ya’ll. I just wanted to alert your readers to the fact the T-Mobile USA’s customer care (1-800-937-8997) is offline right now. It has been since sometime yesterday. Apparently they house all their system stuff in Seattle, WA or Portland, OR or one of those currently waterlogged states. Well, it has caused all their stuff to crash. I called last night and then again this morning and waited past their automated system telling me that they could not view my account info thru the IVR and that the CSR’s were unable to view my account info and to call back later. I spoke with a polite rep Cassie who said that they did not have an ETR on when their systems would be back up and running and that I should try calling back later on today.
We called T-Mobile and sure enough they’re currently unable to pull up anyone’s account info due to the storms. No word on when it will be back up.
Verizon To Go GSM
By 12.2.07
Verizon’s next generation of devices will run on the GSM network that will be used by AT&T and T-Mobile, meaning that in a few years, customers with unlocked phones will be able to move between the three providers without purchasing new equipment. Verizon currently uses a CDMA network along with Sprint, but last week announced that it would use the GSM-protocol LTE (Long Term Evolution) for their fourth-generation data services. Note, Verizon’s LTE phones will not be backwards-compatible with the current GSM networks run by AT&T and T-Mobile. Both are expected to support LTE. And don’t expect to see the new phones anytime soon…
Verizon Ad Appears Next To Story About Death By Exploding Cellphone
By 11.30.07
This ad for Verizon cellphones is placed right next to an AP story about a South Korean man who may or may not have been killed by a cellphone exploding in his shirt pocket. Someone should invent a fancy technology that excludes advertisers from appearing next to articles when the name of their core product appears in editorial proximity with “death” or “exploding.”
Sprint: When All Else Fails Call The Consumerist Hotline
By 11.30.07
I was going insane the last two days. I had signed a renew contract for two years with Sprint in exchange for my first born a new Centro for each of the two lines on my acct. Lo and behold, the Centros arrive and I go to activate one while at work. Activation goes fine and the girl is more than helpful even though she has to do a couple of hoop jumps to get the phone working. I didn’t have time to activate the second one and decided to wait til that night at home. After being transferred to seven representatives, I asked for a supervisor and got Ben in the North Carolina call center who said he had found the problem and had submitted a ticket to get it taken care of and he would call back in three hours after the ticket was completed. You guessed it, no call back.
London Launches SMS Toilet Locator Service
By 11.30.07
Beginning today, if you’re in the Westminster area of London and text the word “toilet” to 80097, you’ll be sent the location of the nearest bathroom. The service costs 25 pence ($0.52) per request.
By 11.30.07
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No thanks, we’re sucking just fine on our own: struggling Sprint rejected a $5 billion investment offer from South Korea’s SK Telecom Co Ltd that would have also installed former chairman Tim Donahue as CEO. [Reuters]
