Going Pink: Why I Ditched AT&T

AT&T has some of the nicest and most talented people in the industry working for it, but over the years those people seem to be the ones who are kept out of the boardrooms making decisions that make sense for their customers and away from the phone lines when I call.

In 2006 after returning from living abroad for years my family signed up with Cingular–even though I generally dislike the color orange.  Because I was a Cingular/AT&T customer for the past 7 years I got to enjoy being a part of every innovation in the cellular industry late.  Currently AT&T’s tagline is Rethink Possible but it does this only when it can’t seem to do anything else.  Let’s review the things I didn’t appreciate during this experience:

I didn’t appreciate being on one of the last carriers to allow me to call family members on other carries without it costing minutes.  Rethink Possible (only after everyone else has done it first)
I didn’t appreciate that when I changed my phone number to a new location it involved three hours of phone calls.
I didn’t appreciate that a year after the iPhone came out AT&T’s website did not have a mobile version or even an app to let me check my minutes, check my messaging, or pay a bill.  It wasn’t fun to scroll across their cluttered site to click on little links with fat fingers just to get some basic data.
I didn’t appreciate that when you call AT&T to try and talk to a live person they send you a text message while you’re on the phone informing you that a website called att.com may be able to handle your issue.  It’s annoying enough to have to call, but then to get a text while you’re on the phone waiting for someone is absurd.
It’s frustrating that in our sub development in Georgia with over 300 houses that had been there for more than 5 years we had to go outside to make a phone call because the signal was so bad.  After calling I got a letter from the head network technician in the state telling me how they had invested millions in their network over the past year.  I’m not sure how that was supposed to make me feel better, because you told me you invested millions of dollars and I still didn’t have signal.  The AT&T rep recommended I spend an additional $200 to buy a AT&T Microcell.  So one month I paid my bill for being able to use their network and paid for a microcell to be able to use their network.  (Full disclosure after an epic rant in an AT&T store I did have a manger call me and credit my account to more than the amount of the microcell–6 months later the purchase and only after an epic rant).
I didn’t appreciate having my phones grandfathered in to the unlimited data plan but not being able to add a new device with similarly unlimited data.
I didn’t appreciate paying for my phones after I had paid for my phones.  This is probably the biggest scam of all.  You see when you upgrade part of your bill is the payment of the phone throughout the term of the contract.  Once your past contract and the phone doesn’t get upgraded AT&T still takes just as much money as they would if you were paying off that phone.  It’s a cash-cow for them.
I didn’t appreciate when I walked into an AT&T corporate store to ask them to unlock my phones the staffer told me to go to ATT.com and fill out a form, then wait 3-5 business days….  Aren’t they my phones?  I paid them off months ago, shouldn’t you automatically unlock them once I’ve paid them off?
I don’t appreciate att.com.  It’s too cluttered.  It’s gotten much better, but compared with Ting.com it’s terrible.

Now let’s talk about what I did like:

I liked how some of the people at AT&T tried to add a human side to the otherwise unfeeling behemoth.  There were many instances where people tried to take care of us.  The non corporate AT&T store in North Logan Utah has some of the nicest and most effective people I’ve ever met in any industry.  Someone from corporate ought to take a look at how they treat others and make that the standard especially on the phone!  The good folks in Lawton Oklahoma took a look at our plan and found 3 or 4 different ways we could save money on our bill–we didn’t even ask them for a review.  We had come in for one thing and they helped us get more and save more.  Remember that epic rant I mentioned above?  It was at the Lawton store.  The guy was polite and listened to me then had someone from corporate call me back to try and resolve my issues.
The network.  When I travel there’s generally signal.  It’s just unfortunate there wasn’t signal when I was at my home in Georgia.  I’ve been on several interstates and back roads where I’d have enough bars to make a call.  I know it wasn’t easy putting that together and I was grateful when it was there.

What finally got me to switch?

AT&T isn’t global–or it is–but at a premium.  T-Mobile’s new offer to be able to use data/text in over 100 countries just makes sense.  You’re routing my data over the internet anyway and it doesn’t cost you any more to route it in one country vs another.  I’m sure in 6 months AT&T will have that feature, but why am I paying them to Rethink Possible after the other guys?
I’m only paying for my phones until they’re paid for, and I can see how much I owe on them and pay them off when I want to.
They don’t send me a text message to go to their website when I call 611 and treat me as if they were trying to help an old friend on the phone, not just a customer.

I’m going to hang up the phone now.