www.engadget.com/entry/1234000717038088
cell complaints Weve heard complaints about every major carrier in the country (no, wer e not going to call up the president of Sprint and bitch on your behalf) , but if youre looking to switch and want something a little more offic ial to base your decision on than that you heard that your sisters boyf riends dads co-worker gets crappy reception near Taco Bell, Consumers Union (the people behind Consumer Reports) have just published a report based on FCC data that ranks each of the major US wireless carrier in t erms of customer complaints.
AT&T Wi reless and its awful track record must have really hurt their standing o r Cingular must be raising the bar on the number of complaints theyll t olerate, because Verizon Wireless had about one-fourth as many complaint s per million customers.
Brett For what it's worth, I am guessing a lot of the Cingular/AT&T complaints have to do with the integration. I recently had trouble with my service due to some work that was done to the towers in my area. Otherwise, I've never had any service issues worth complaining about. Each FCC complaint is much more se rious than someone just bitching to customer service. People rarely file FCC complaints, so these numbers are not nearly as close as they might appear. I lived in NJ and went to school in RI du ring that time. I can honestly say that, not until this year, i could ne ver hold more than a 10 minute conversation while driving on rt 95 betwe en the 2 states. Even in NJ the coverage was crap, and I lived 30minutes from NYC. Throughout a 2 year period, i would p eriodically call to have the bill changed to my name. Only requirement f rom ATT was that my mom call and verify the name change. Every time i called they would say i need her to "allow" t he name change (and she called them to "allow" the change multiple times for me). I gave up eventually never changing the name on the account (i 'm a good son and pay anyway so her credit's all good). Another thing they jerked me around on was auto payments. I gave them the account to auto deduct from and they said all was setup. Few months later, after sucessfull auto deductions, i get another $100+ bill, service termination pending, yada yada yada. The reason AT&T merged with Cingular is, AT&T's customers were leaving in droves after the phone number portability regs were implemented. Nowmerger is completing you see a lot of the AT&T Wireless people in top management places and some of th e old attitudes are starting to peek through. Currently Cingular is the most aggressive at Customer support, but I'm waiting to see what happens .
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 12:14 PM ET by skid Haha, I always knew ATT/Cingular sucked. Glad to see I wasn't the only on e Along with my boycott of Cingular products, I have also done the same with HP/Bombpaq - and have been much happier for last few years!
I tried Verizon here i n NYC (it honestly has a really good rep here, which is why I tried it) and *every* single call I made - on three different phones - went immedi ately to analog. The call quality was ok in analog but it also meant tha t I couldn't use any of the data services either. Sprint is too overpriced, and their new plans are confusing. I had them f or a while and dropped them when my basic family plan (two phones) with *no* options topped $80 a month with taxes included. Cingular is $65 (includes tax) for the same level of service and I'm happ y enough with the quality. I'm on the real Cingular network, from before they merged, so maybe AT&T really is pulling them down, and maybe the " old" Cingular is not that good elsewhere either.
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 1:13 PM ET by Greg Alford I had a service dispute with Cingular that led to my switching to Verizon a few years ago. I was really happy with Verizon, but got a great deal on an AT&T phone after the merger. When my year is up, I am going to go running back to Verizon.
Ryan Edward Tufte debunked this kinda of data analysis/presentation years ago. I'm not here to defend any of the carriers, but it's plain to see that the graph does not tell the whole story.
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 2:13 PM ET by jen craaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaap. currently have two phones - one verizon and one ci ngular that i'm switching to - cingular has the good phones but the serv ice i'm not so sure about, verizon has the service but their phones suck hard.
Nate MC I think it's because the Verizon customers have no idea how to complain a bout their service. Verizon techs always tell me the static comes free of charge!
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 2:56 PM ET by mark murky waters here... to add on to comment #6 - the demographic aspects of each carrier mean al ot when considering the source of this data. what carrier's clientele is more likely to file the formal and valid FCC complaint? it has always been my understanding that VZW Customer Service would give their customer the world after enough hoops had been jumped through. Cingular will always get the highest number of complaints, regardless of what they do/don't do. they seem to consider every customer the same as the next, not one better than another. which on a whole, isn't so bad, e xcept that the base level of concern for the customer is set very low be low the bar...
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 3:35 PM ET by Frank If this survey was rating daycare providers, I might put some stock into it but quantifying the overall "worth" of a provider on number of compla ints is pointless. As a true cellphone hoe, I've been with nearly every major (US) carrier. I know for a fact that all of us get good r eception in our respective apartments (in Chicago). We all hang out toge ther and text each other and call each other. However, I recently overheard overheard my friend decrying T-Mobile as being terrib le. After questioning her, she couldn't come up with one valid reason wh y she was unhappy with her service. I neve r have a problem hearing her when she's on her cell. She has her phone t hrough a corporate account and pretty much doesn't have to worry about t ypical customer service issues. The only negative p oint she can ever articulate is how she can't figure out how to switch b ack to the first caller after answering the other line. The only true way to test a network is the same way we test everything el se objectively: through controlled experiments. Get a phone from each ca rrier, stand at point X,Y, make a call at X o'clock, evaluate signal str ength, etc.
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 4:02 PM ET by scotttreo This lists the number of FCC complaints so it is valid. I' filed a compla int against ATT with the FCC which finally got them to actually resolve the billing issue. To file a complaint you just can't say 'I don't care for them' or 'somtimes I get static'. Most of the time these are by people who can't get the carrier to resolve the issue or who continue to have major problems. These numbers represe nt the numbers of real users who have had enough and taken the extra tim e and effort to make a formal complaint.
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 5:50 PM ET by Mark im guessing 75% of those complaint Cingular/AT&T had were because of AT&T . It sucked ass whenever i had it, but i've had cingular for the past 6 months and its badass, sprint was by far the worst service i've ever had .
Posted Mar 29, 2005, 8:08 PM ET by jands Yep, Cingular tried to steal $75 of some text messages I was suppose to g et for free. But I managed to get them back when I filed a complaint.
Add your comments Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry: inappropriate or p urely promotional comments may be removed. Email addresses are never dis played, but they are required to confirm your comments. To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we w ill make it a live link for you. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted no need to use <p> or <br> tags. Your name (required): Your email address (required, will not be shown to the public): Your sites URL (optional): Do you want us to remember your personal information for next time?
|
http://csua.com/feed/