Well, it's getting to be time to ditch the ol' cell phone -- the contract expires in June. But about a week ago, the phone stopped working altogether, and I didn't bother to call customer service since I never use the damn thing anyway. This morning, I finally got around to it, figuring that I needed to speak to them about closing my account anyway. Here's what transpired...
The customer service representative told me that the phone itself was broken and needed to be either repaired or replaced. She asked me to take it to the local Cingular for that purpose. I pointed out that my contract expires next month and I don't plan to renew, so going out of my way to have the phone looked at didn't make any sense. Could they just let the contract expire and not bill me for the final month of service, since the phone is broken? No, she tells me, they can let the service expire, but they have to bill me for the month that the phone isn't working.
I've dealt with idiotic CSRs in the past, of course -- everyone has. Realizing that pursuing that matter further would be to bang my head against a brick wall, I simply agreed to let them send me the bill, after which I will refuse to pay it and challenge anything they might end up trying to do to my credit rating. The trick with dealing with bureaucracies, at least some of the time, is knowing when and how to do an "end run" around them.
In other news, we actually have sunshine outside today, much to my relief. My eyesight is rather sensitive, so I don't care for bright light, but I also appear to have some form of SAD (seasonal affective disorder), so the last month or so has been pretty tough on me. I hope I can be more alert today than I have been for the last couple of weeks or so.
Haven't installed Linux yet -- I want to do a backup of my workstation's hard drive, obviously, before I start monkeying around with it, and I haven't had time to do that. Maybe tomorrow, we'll see.
In other news, while going thru the corporate IT inventory, I found an old three-gig internal hard drive that someone must have bought before I was hired here and never used. I think I'll crack the case on my workstation and see about installing it just for kicks.
Posted by Zathras at May 30, 2003 10:26 AMYou're lucky you only have to deal with only that. I had to cancel my cel phone contract in Maine 'cuz they were secretly charging a VERY HIGH roaming fee on top of a roamin' fee. They're still chasing after me for it . . .
I only use pre-paid stuff like Tracfone now. Saves a shitload of $ and contracts.
Posted by: Shaw at May 30, 2003 03:00 PMOkay...first, I know people that have fought the cell companies on charges. They lost, and it *did* hurt their credit rating.
Second, call me nuts, but this scenario seems a bit strange. You're being billed for a service you don't use...then you lose access to the unused service, and therefore wish to not be billed -- for something you weren't using in the first place? What does it matter whether you have access or not if you never use it?
Posted by: Moggy at May 31, 2003 01:53 AMIt doesn't matter... I actually tried to cancel that cell phone several months ago but couldn't because of the cancellation penalties, so instead I switched to the least expensive monthly plan available and decided to just wait until my contract expired.
I will fight the cell phone company on this, and I suspect they won't bother to fight... it's only twelve dollars. Even if they do, I'm entitled to put a 200-word explanation into my credit report, explaining why I wouldn't pay their bill.
Yes, you're right, the whole scenario is pretty strange. The only reason I'm in it, as I said, is that if I were to cancel my cell phone back in, February I think was when I checked on it, I'd have faced something like a $175 cancellation penalty, whereas if I switched to the $12/month plan and kept the phone, over the next five months, it would be only $60, obviously. So ridiculously enough, it was actually cheaper for me to keep the phone active and not use it than it was to cancel the service.
Hmm. I think I'll float this whole scenario past my mother and see what she has to say about it... she's got a lot of horse sense.
Posted by: Zathras at May 31, 2003 10:41 AMThis is why y'wanna avoid cel-phone contracts. They will bill you, no matter if you want to use their service or not.
There should be some sort of "consumer's bill of rights" about cel-phone contracts. Too many folks are gettin' ripped off...
Posted by: Shaw at May 31, 2003 12:14 PMDig this website. One fuckin' long url, but it has some interestin' horror stories:
http://www.sprintpcs-sucks.org/howsprintpcsscrewedotherpeople/howsprintpcsscrewedotherpeople.html
Posted by: Shaw at May 31, 2003 07:21 PMIs your mom a horse? oh wait, I see the link to her page. I guess that answers my question.
Posted by: MissIndependant at May 31, 2003 09:56 PMwha? Who's da insulter?
Posted by: Shaw at June 1, 2003 12:16 AMHis mom's not a horse, but she *is* endorsed by an independent lab. :-)
Posted by: Sparrow at June 2, 2003 01:58 AM