Upon my bill being unusually high this month compared to previous months, I decided to contact customer care. I spoke with a woman named Antonia Pride who at first was fairly pleasant but progressively got nastier by the minute when she could not adequately explain why my bill was $120 more this month than last. She told me "sweetie, you can look at the bill for yourself." Really? The last time I checked, I didn’t work for AT&T??? I asked to speak to her manager, not even regarding my bill being more but because of her poor customer service skills.
Let me also state that I have been an AT&T customer for 10+ years and not only have AT&T for my mobile phones (3 of them) but also for my iPad service, cable, internet, home phone AND digital life (home alarm, camera & monitoring system).
I was placed on a brief hold after speaking to Antonia and requesting a manager. Antonia came back on the phone telling me the manager would call me back. I asked her "Are there no available managers to speak with me at the moment?" She repeated herself saying, "The manager will call you back." I then asked for her employee ID. For those who don’t know, all AT&T employees obtain an employee ID, I know this because my family works for different areas in AT&T, employees willingly give out this information to customers however Antonia was refusing to give me her employee ID.
FUNNY, THEN THE MANAGER WAS AVAILABLE ALL OF THE SUDDEN! I got on the phone with the manager, his name was Ryan W[edited for privacy – please do not post personal information]. He began speaking about my bill and I explained that I was not asking to speak to a manager regarding my bill but to report the poor customer service skills of Antonia P , he completely blew off what I was saying and still continued trying to speak to me about my bill. I expressed my disgust for the way the both of them were treating an AT&T customer who spends hundreds of dollars a month with their company. I asked Ryan for his employee ID and Antonia's employee ID and Ryan went back to talking about my bill!!! I again asked for the ID numbers and he said "he is not allowed to give out his employee number." I asked if this was a corporate policy (knowing employees can give out their employee ID) and he replied with "I am not comfortable."
I am a general manager of two multi million-dollar businesses, let me first express how important customer service is in an industry where you have so much competition. Secondly, I have the right to question why I am being overcharged, however that was really irrelevant.
I paid a $1200 bill two months ago while I was out of the country for business. I accept the cost of the expenses I agree to but do not want to be charged for services I didn’t use. I would be crazy to say "Okay no problem, AT&T overcharged me by $120, no big deal!"
Money is not the issue here, its the god awful, terribly poor customer service from not only Antonia P but her manager Ryan W.
AT&T has lost a valuable customer, if it were not 8:30 at night; I would be cancelling all of my services right now. But all will be cancelled by the end of this week. There are many other companies out there that can AT LEAST RESPECT THEIR CUSTOMERS!!!!!