I recently added a phone to my family plan. After giving all the information required, waiting a couple of days, getting called back for more information, filling out an online form, getting called back again, and a 4th time, I finally recieved my new phone ready to port. And then I received a second identical phone with a receipt that I was going to be charged twice for the same phone.
Because I have a family plan, I thought having the second phone in hand would be a good opportunity to upgrade one of my lines. I called up At&t to find out how to do this, and discovered the following:
1.) They made a mistake and sent me two phones.
2.) This problem has been happening with other customers.
3.) If I didn't send it back within 14 days, I would get charged the full retail price for the phone.
4.) If I wanted to upgrade one of the lines on my family plan, I would have to do that with a separate transaction. The second phone they sent me could not be used in this way. I had to ship it back to them, and then if I ordered a new phone they would ship (hopefully only one this time) the new (identical) phone to me.
5.) It took me 45 minutes to get this information because the first two very cheerful incorrect customer service people thought what I was asking seemed reasonable and do-able.
6.) In the end, I wasted 45 min trying to save At&t money and time, and all I received was an empty "I'm sorry for the inconvenience this has caused."
I don't know if anyone reads these posts and uses them to help decide policies or training, but if so, consider the following policies really annoying for one long time At&t customer:
1.) making mistakes and then holding me responsible for fixing them.
2.) charging me money for your mistakes, and making me responsible for getting it refunded.
3.) having customer service staff tell me they think an idea will work when it is apparantly against policy. 4.) Being unable to offer me anything more than the words "I'm sorry for your inconvienience," to convince me that I should keep being an At&t customer.