Raging Against the Machine (the T-Mobile Edition)

I lent The Girlfriend my credit card and she lost it. Well, technically, it was in my possession last. But because I gave it to her and she handed it back to me a day later, my rhythm was disrupted and I didn’t put the card where it belongs in my wallet. So you see, it’s all her fault: if I never gave her the card, I wouldn’tve lost it (or would that make it my fault for giving it to her?).

Anywhos, a lost credit card can be a bit of a pain because of all the things I have set up on autopay. I had to change the credit card on file with my landlord and other various companies that automatically bill me every month. A drag–but not impossible.

Unfortunately, the transition didn’t go as smoothly as I hoped. Even after I changed the credit card on file, T-Mobile kept sending me text messages, insisting that my bill couldn’t be processed. After logging on to T-Mobile’s website and confirming the card number had been changed, I had no choice but to call them up.

I’ve had very little complaints about T-Mobile. They’re not as bad as Sprint–but T-Mobile is still part of the corporate machine. You gotta verbally enter a bunch of information ahead of time before you can even talk to anyone. The computers hafta know where to direct your call…all in the name of profit.

I’ve often wondered how important it is to get directed to the right department in the first place. A lot of times, the person you’re talking to can help with billing, technical, or payment questions. Are consumers entering ‘department requests’ in order to talk to the right person…or to kill time instead of having to hear that gawdawful hold music? But that’s another question for another day.

Seeing how I recently had throat surgery, my voice is very weak and limited–not good when you’re talking to a machine that operates solely on voice command. I was screaming at the machine and getting completely nowhere because it had no idea what I wanted.

After 15 minutes of waiting, I got a hold of someone. I explained my situation and asked what was needed to rectify the situation. She was glad to comply…but first I had to give my password.

Passwords are a bit of a bitch in today’s world. Clearly you don’t wanna use the same password for everything because if you give your password to T-Mobile, they can access your Hotmail account. Identity thieves have made the world a much more difficult place to live in. It gets harder and harder to remember everything nowadays. And you can’t write your password down–I saw “War Games.” Every website, business, or place you’ve ever been to–a different password. It’s remarkable I’m able to keep all of them in my head.

I gave the woman I spoke to my ‘password’–a password I use on a daily basis when I log into the T-Mobile website to check my email. But she said that wasn’t the password–that I gave her something completely different.”

“How can that be,” I asked. “I just logged on the website this morning.” She had no clue–insisting the password was something else. We debated this issue for a few minutes. I told her that it’s the only one I ever use with T-Mobile. “Do you want other information? Is it my mother’s maiden name or the last four of my social?” She insisted she didn’t know–other than it was a “password.”

This was getting nowhere and I was losing my cool. I asked if there was another way to verify my account. I knew my social, my address–I was calling from the damn phone for cripes’ sake. All wasn’t good enough.

“But you can drive down to a T-Mobile story and reset your password there,” she offered.

“I’m not driving anywhere–I don’t know what you people think, but I don’t have time to go around jumping through hoops.”

Eventually, I started shouting every password, number, and knock-knock joke I knew at her. One of those proved to be the proper password (…just don’t ask me to remember which one it was). At that point, my throat was killing me, my patience was gone, and we hadn’t even attempted to solve what I was calling about.

I repeated my story–how T-Mobile has been sending me text messages that my credit card couldn’t be processed. I told her that there must be a problem on T-Mobile’s end but I already changed the card info. She offered a multitude of useless excuses…ranging from I haven’t activated the card yet or there’s a problem with the bank.

“That can’t be it–I already used the card twice today,” I told her. “Just run it again.”

The woman gladly offered to help me…but would hafta impose a $5 charge to bill the credit card. I flew off the handle. “Why? What charge? This is ridiculous! I have my account set on autopay so I don’t hafta deal with this! Just run it again!”

We argued this issue for a little bit. She cited T-Mobile policy; I cited justice and being completely without fault. After being belittled by me, she caved and attempted to process the transaction. “Approved,” she said.

“Was that hard,” I quipped. “We coulda saved time and effort if you just did this in the first place.” And that’s when I asked to speak with a supervisor.

I know it’s not her fault–she was just doing all her job allowed her. But in this world where the consumer gets completely screwed and is supposed to bend over backwards for the corporations, I can’t stand to sit still. Unless you complain about something, nothing ever changes. This whole situation–me having to call in, argue with her, try and get resolve a situation that didn’t need resolving–it’s all done because T-Mobile finds it more fiscally beneficial to them. They wanna charge me $5 to manually run the credit card because it cost them money to pay someone to do it. They want me to wait on hold because it cost them money to hire more people. Everything is designed for profit and efficiency by people who probably have never spent a day answering a phone in their life. The only way anything will ever change or get better is if you’re willing to fight for what you think is right. Let’s get customer service back in out society. Let’s put a few less dollars in the executives’ pockets and make a more efficient and less stressful system. I shouldn’t hafta bow to T-Mobile–T-Mobile should hafta bow to me. After all, they want my money.

When I asked to talk to her supervisor, she actually tried to talk me out of it. She asked if there was anything I could do (I simply launched into a tyrant like the previous paragraph). I told her, above all, I was without fault. Yet here I was, forced to waste my time and try to fix a situation I already did everything in my power to fix. My time meant something to me–and I wanted T-Mobile to compensate me for my time.

“I gave give you 50 bonus minutes on next month’s bill?”

“That’s a step in the right direction, but totally useless to me–I normally have over 800 unused minutes every month. I want a ring tone, a game, $5 off next month–something from T-Mobile that I can use. T-Mobile wanted to charge me $5 for a credit card transaction; I wanna charge T-Mobile for this phone call.”

She was hesitant to transfer me–saying there was little a supervisor could do. This is the only area where I fault her. When you work in customer service and someone asks to talk to a supervisor, you do it. I know I’d do it–it takes the problem out of my hands. Let someone else deal with it. But she offered numerous excuses–including no one was available or I’d hafta wait a long time.

“I can wait. Or they can call me back. I have a complaint that I don’t want to fall on deaf ears.”

Miraculously and instantly, a supervisor became available.

Once again, I explained the whole situation. He let me vent and scream. When I was finished, I told him the bottom line. “I did nothing wrong. I’ve wasted 20 minutes of my time dealing with this just because T-Mobile screwed up and won’t differ from policy. I want to be compensated for my time. Gimmie a ring tone, game, or discount on my bill–it really doesn’t matter what.”

“All you want is a free ring tone?” He sounded confused. Maybe it’s because I was screaming like a deranged lunatic and wanting nothing in return–kinda like a bank robber full of hostages who wants 120 bucks.

“That’s it–give me something I want as payment for the time and stress I had to endure to get this resolved.”

“I can give you a credit for a free ring tone on next month’s bill–will that be it?”

“Yep.”

It may seem like a small–almost trivial–victory. But it’s not to me. I proved my point. I wasn’t going to get walked over. I got something to show for my 20 minutes. Sure my throat is killing me and I got a headache afterwards, but I got something–they screwed up and were willing to give me something for having to deal with it. It’s a small victory–but at least I can go to bed at night and feel good about myself. And not in a dirty way.