While Jeff Cannizzaro was off fighting in Iraq, he was also fighting Sprint. Jeff suspended his phone while overseas, but left some money in the account. While he was away, Sprint kept deducting small amounts from his balance. His wife kept calling and writing emails, trying everything they could think of to get Sprint to stop deducting the money. Nothing worked.
sprint
Sprint's "Nucking Futs" "Jessica" Fired
By 4.16.08
benpopken: How did the company track down which “Jessica” it was?
Get Free Sprint Features With URL Hacking
By 4.14.08
Two more instances of Sprint’s insecure online system:
Sprint To Customer: "Are You Nucking Futs?"
By 4.12.08
Reader Pam asked Jessica if she could port her landline to her mobile account, prompting the Sprint CSR to respond: “No, are you nucking futz?” Pam wasn’t expecting an abusive chat when she visited Sprint’s website to research a potential contract extension, but Jessica unexpectedly appeared with advice that wasn’t just rude, but also wrong.
Sprint Forces You To Pay $988.00 For A Phone You Never Used
By 4.10.08
Here’s a sad story from reader Kristin:
Flawed Sprint Security Worse Than We Thought
By 4.9.08
In the comments on our post exposing a flaw in Sprint’s online account security that would let a stranger completely take control of your cellphone account, a former Sprint rep says it’s even weaker than what we thought. How? Reader Dragonfire81 says that every question about cars has three luxury models and one typical car, making it pretty easy to guess. “None of the above” for “which properties have you owned” was correct 99% of the time. And worst of all, you only need to answer two of the questions correctly to gain access to an account. “I was shocked at the number of times I was able to access an account by simply guessing the answers,” he writes. “Fortunately I am an ethical person, but if I wasn’t I could’ve done a LOT of damage very easily.” Here’s his comment in full:
Flawed Security Lets Sprint Accounts Get Easily Hijacked
By 4.8.08
We found you can hijack a Sprint user’s account as long as you know their cellphone number, just a smidge about them, and have half a brain. Once inside, you have total access to their account. You could change their billing address, order a whole bunch of cellphones sent to a drop location, and leave the victim paying the bill. There’s also the stalker’s wet dream: add GPS tracking to their cellphone and secretly watch their every movement from any computer. Reader Jim told Sprint about this 2 months ago but they ignored him, so I tested it out and am publishing the results in the hope of getting Sprint to fix this exploit. I’ll show you we cracked into a Sprint account and just how much damage I could have done, inside…
At Sprint, Nothing's SIMple
By 4.2.08
Allison and her husband wanted to reduce the amount of minutes they’re signed up for on their Sprint-Nextel cellphone plan. While that was a hassle in of itself and Allison ended up getting a phone with another company, the fun really begins once “”Insert SIM” started flashing on her husband’s phone (which is on the Nextel network, which uses SIM cards). Sprint seemed convinced that the SIM card had been reported as lost or stolen and couldn’t be activated. This was very bad as it was her husband’s business line. What followed were a series of 45+ minute call time waits, disconnected customer service calls, fruitless visits to the store, conflicting and confusing information given by different customer service reps and tech support personnel. During the fracas, her husband lost one customer who hadn’t been able to reach him during the outage. Over 100 days into the reign of new Sprint CEO Dan Hesse and shennanigans like the following story are still happening. Oh Danny-boy, are one of the “nukes” you have planned for revamping Sprint aimed at customer service?
Sprint Twiddles Thumbs While 12-Year Customers Get Scammed For $2,500
By 3.31.08
Someone hacked this couple’s Sprint account, and bought four new phones on it, leaving these 12-year customers to pay over $2,500. Every time they called Sprint, the fraud department said not to worry and that the charges would be off the bill next month, but the disconnect notices kept arriving until Sprint shut off their phone. Only after a local consumer reporter got involved was the problem solved. When asked why it took so long, Sprint said, “it takes a while to complete a thorough investigation.” If you’re a legacy Nextel customer now with Sprint, you may want to ask about getting a PIN set up on your account. The account seemed to have been targeted (the fraud department said probably by someone inside Sprint) because it was an old Nextel account that didn’t have a PIN.
Former Sprint CSR Tells All
By 3.31.08
A man who worked on the front line of Sprint’s customer service department sent us some dirt on what goes on over there, including officially designated fake supervisors, obnoxious personal notes left in your account from your last call, and credit quotas of about $2.50 per call. “I was once punished by a Supervisor and written up because I was giving too many courtesy credits. Apparently Sprint doesn’t feel that being transferred 7 times and then hung up on is worth $10 in return.”
This Sprint Plan Lets You Talk For 1.9 Years Per Month. What?
By 3.29.08
BG’s Sprint plan lets him talk for 1,000,499 minutes per month and only costs $50. How did he find this stupefyingly amazing plan? Hit the jump for his story.
Sprint Offers Loyalty Discount To Customers Who Ask For It
By 3.25.08
Michael wrote in to let us know that in spite of Sprint’s customer service shortcomings, the company is happy to give a discount to those customers who have remained with the beleaguered wireless provider. Here is the email exchange Michael had with Sprint…
Sprint Magically Approves Rejected Rebate Application
By 3.22.08
He writes:
I’ve been a Sprint customer for around ten years, and in early February decided to upgrade to a new HTC Mogul smartphone under Sprint’s “New For You” rebate program which gives existing customers the same price on new phones that new customers get, as long as the existing customers agree to extend their contracts. To get a $100 rebate, I agreed to extend for two years–not really a problem, as I have no plans to leave Sprint. I received the phone and mailed in the rebate form.
Sprint Gouges Business Customer For Over $30,000 In Inflated Fees
By 3.17.08
Allen Harkleroad of GMP Services writes, “A warning to all Sprint corporate customers that have dedicated access (T1’s, etc.) if you are out of contract Sprint may be gouging you and claiming outrageously high local loop charges as the cause.”
Carriers Promised Congress They'd Pro-Rate ETFs; Senator Asks Them, "When?"
By 3.14.08
In a letter to Sprint, AT&T Mobility, and T-Mobile, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) has asked the companies whether or not they’re going to start pro-rating their Early Termination Fee policies as promised, reports RCR Wireless. “Sens. Klobuchar and Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) are co-sponsors of a sweeping wireless consumer protection bill” that carriers are against. In her letter, Klobuchar writes, “It is time for the wireless companies to adhere to the assurances they made to the American consumer and start pro-rating these fees.” In response, Sprint said by the end of Q2 2008, T-Mobile said the first half of 2008, and AT&T Mobility said nothing at all. (Verizon already pro-rates their ETF.)
Email Addresses For Sprint's Board Of Directors
By 3.14.08
Here are working email addresses for the Sprint board of directors. Should the special phone line Sprint set up for Consumerist readers (703-433-4401) somehow fail to work out or someday cease working, these represent yet a higher level to which you could escalate a long-standing complaint. We hear you can also use these addresses to submit hostile takeover bids.
By 3.7.08
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Rumors on the Internets: T-Mobile may be consider buying Sprint in order to keep the company from lowering its prices and triggering a price war, says Merrill Lynch. “In such a price war scenario, we think T-Mobile would face the most pressure, and Deutsche Telekom would see the increased urgency to drive market repair,” the firm’s analysts said.
Sprint Loses $29.5 Billion Dollars In A Single Quarter
By 2.29.08
Sprint has announced a fourth quarter loss of $29.5 billion, says the Chicago Tribune. Most of the loss is due to a one-time $29.5 billion writedown of its purchase of Nextel. The wireless carrier says it expects 1.2 million additional customers to leave this quarter, citing dropped calls and poor customer service as their reason for seeking less frustrating pastures.
Chief Executive Dan Hesse, who took over in December, said business is worse than he expected and is deteriorating.
