Summary: Faulty software which ends up being fixed in a few minutes takes ATT 4 months to be smart enough to get taken care of.
Samsung A777 phone. Advanced calendar functions don't work right. Over time ATT ships me 5 replacement phones none of which work right.
Cons: 4 months dealing with ATT after figuring out the problem. Calling ATT at least 9 times but probably more. (Averaging around an hour on the phone each time). Each time going through all the same details and troubleshooting only to end up not being helped (except the last time).
Pros: Over time the last few warranty service reps felt bad enough that I was overall credited $75 towards my account. Finally the problem was fixed.
Solutions I offered which were refused: Letting me go back to how I was before the new phone. Still be an ATT customer with my old phone and no 2 year contract. Them working with Samsung on my behalf and getting the software issue resolved. Getting me a different make and model which had the same calendar abilities without requiring a data plan.
Conclusion: The fix was not complicated. The fix was not hard. The fix probably would have worked the very first time. (A firm over the air update was all that was needed.) It leads me to believe that almost everyone you may deal with in warranty really aren't trained to do what you need done. They are only trained to do what a computer tells them to do. You will only be helped if the computer happens to include your issue in it's programming. If you aren't included you are treated like you are the problem. I even had a warranty representative around the 3 or 4th phone tell me that they thought there wasn't a problem and that I was just doing things wrong.
I have been an AT&T customer for around 2 1/2 years. After my first 2 year contract expired my original phone still worked fine but I decided to look into other phones because it would not cost me anything extra to get one other than agreeing to another 2 year contract. I finally decided to get a new phone because the Samsung A777 had advanced calendar functions without requiring a data plan.
I got the phone just before Christmas. My family was on vacation and so I was not using the phone in it's normal sense. We got back and I noticed a problem with the alarm function in the advanced calendar functions. There are a lot of options while setting those alarms so I assumed that I just wasn't doing it right.in fact sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. Over time I found out that it would never work if you happend to set an alarm to go off any time but during the day of the appointment. (It is supposed to be able to. You can set an appointment for the following day and ask the alarm to go off 9 hours in advance (the night before) but it did not work). When I finally realized it was not me as the operator and had the time to contact ATT it had been just over 30 days. Due to that the only options they would allow would be to send the phone in for replacement. I decided to check with Samsung to see if there was a software update which would fix the problem. The first Samsund agent I dealt with soon passed me off to level 2. Level 2 had a A777 phone and went through the steps with me only to be very surprised that their phone did not work either. They passed me up to level 3. Level 3 had a phone, went through the same process, and their phone worked. They had a newer software version. I was told it was not available in any way other than sending the phone in to them. (At least 5 to 10 business days not including shipping). I worked with ATT first because they were more interested in me (I thought) because they were the ones receiving my money. Later I sent the phone to Samsung, waited 2 weeks, only to get the phone back with the same problem. Whatever they did was not what was requested. At that point I went back to dealing with ATT.
So, ATT was willing to send me 5 replacement phones at their expense. They were willing over time to credit me around $75 to my account.in the end though except for the last representative I dealt with I was treated like I was the problem, like I was probably mistaken, and that I was unreasonable.in the end the last rep helped me and even said sorry. I greatly appreciated that but still can no longer reccommend ATT as a company due to how bad the whole situation was.
0 comments