Sprint breaks up with high-maintenance customers
The squeaky wheel doesn't always get the grease.
At least not if the squeaky wheel is a Sprint Nextel customer. On June 29, 2007, Sprint sent letters notifying some customers that their service would be canceled by the end of July due to excessive calls to customer service.
"Our records indicate that over the past year, we have received frequent calls from you regarding your billing or other general account information," the letter reads. "While we have worked to resolve your issues and questions to the best of our ability, the number of inquiries you have made to us during this time has led us to determine that we are unable to meet your current wireless needs."
"Therefore after careful consideration, the decision has been made to terminate your wireless service agreement effective July 30, 2007."
Subscribers who have gotten letters from Sprint terminating their service won't have to pay the early termination fee. Their account balances will also be set to zero. But subscribers will have to sign up with a new wireless provider by July 30 if they want to keep their phone numbers. Otherwise, the numbers won't be available after the Sprint service ends, the letter states.
(You can take a look at one of these letters posted within this discussion stream on a Sprint users' forum.) And click here to see an image of one of the letters.
The company's new tagline: 'Sprint Ahead.'
(Credit: Sprint Nextel)A Sprint spokeswoman acknowledged that a group of letters had been sent out on June 29. She said that only a "small minority" of customers were impacted.
"We have to be able to quickly and efficiently serve customers," said Roni Singleton, a Sprint spokeswoman. "And when we are unable to consistently solve our customers' problems it results in a lot of frustration and longer waits for other customers. So after looking through our records, we were able to determine that there were customers who we could couldn't meet their current needs."
Singleton said it was normal business practice for Sprint to audit customer service interactions. She also said the company has always reserved the right in its terms of use to terminate the contract for whatever reason.
Posting on the Sprint users' message board, one customer who received one of these letters said the calls she made to Sprint were for errors in the company's billing. She also questioned how the company counted the number of calls.
"I absolutely didn't call as much as they say I did, but I did always have the hang up/transfer scenario--even today calling in I was hung up on twice and transferred at least five times," she said in one of her posts. "I mean I DREAD calling in and sitting on hold, why on earth would I do it unless I had to!"
Clearly, Sprint is trying to shed customers who seem to eat up too many resources. But it seems crazy that a company that's already having a hard time keeping subscribers would be willing terminate contracts.
For years, Sprint has had a reputation for poor customer service and poor network coverage, and as a result, the company is suffering. For the first quarter of 2007, it reported a loss of 220,000 post-paid monthly subscribers--customers who pay monthly. This was the third quarter in a row the company had a substantial loss of these types of customers. The company has consistently had one of the worst churn rates in the wireless industry. At the end of the first quarter of 2007, Sprint reported a churn rate of 2.7 percent.
This issue has gotten me wondering about wireless contracts in general. If you are a Sprint customer who recently received one of these letters, or you've received a similar letter from another carrier, please write me at maggie.reardon@cnet.com.
Marguerite Reardon has been a CNET News reporter since 2004, covering cell phone services, broadband, citywide Wi-Fi, the Net neutrality debate, as well as the ongoing consolidation of the phone companies. E-mail Maggie.
Will this be the new iPhone strategy?
...that way if I don't like my contract, I merely have to call 'em up about 4-5 times a day with 'problems' (trust me, they can be found easily enough), and *poof* - no more contract or termination fee.
Sweet!
although they do make some mistakes, nothing serious has happened to our service. i think sprint is an good provider. and please dont try to force your opinions down each others throats (and mine)
timing on sprints part. This is a major business faux pas on sprints
part, and opportunity on the consumer side. Hmmmmm, now that
iPhone looks interesting....
Very nice. Hey, they've got to pay for the millions of $$ they're dropping on NASCAR somehow.
Lots of companies "fire" customers - some even on purpose. In the old days of Sprint when they had that Girl Voice Customer Service Robot the best way to navigate their voice-recognition system was to curse. If you told her to go F-herself you would get a panicky response and would be expedited through their system.
It was kind of funny. I tested their system a few times and by cursing I always go a human being faster. Of course that didn't always mean you got actual help...
My contract runs out in January - can you fire me?
According to recent news articles about "contracts of adhesion", a customer can challenge the termination fee based on the unfair contract. But I wonder if a customer could argue that the fair thing is to make Spring pay $175, just as Spring would have made the customer pay $175.
unresponsive. They cut off my phone for "non payment," even
though the check in question had cleared their billing
department.
Their attempts to continue my never-late, multi-year account
were pathetic. Of course, they were more forthcoming AFTER I
signed up with T-mobile.
I would consider such a letter from Sprint a notice of
emancipation. If you have Sprint, start calling and complaining
NOW, to get out of your contract!!
Their customer service is horrible and completely unhelpful. I had a crazy ex girlfriend who started calling me at all hours of the night, having her friends call and threaten me and all Sprint would say is that I should report it to the police... all I wanted was a block on a number and they wouldn't do that. 5 more months and counting unless I start complaining now :)
It's 2007 and the customer hasnt been right for a long time.
Say what you will about Sprint, its the same freaking service as all the rest! Every single carrier has black spots where the phones don't work. If your complaining about your cell phone not working in a particular spot, feel free to collect trillions of dollars and build your own network! Remember it wasn't more than 15 years ago, the general, average public didn't have cell phones!
However if Sprint created the issues...Stupid Stupid, Stupid.
Take T-Mobile. I just signed up.
They said my phone would connect by USB so I could download Photo's Correct. Nope. Call #1.
I signed up for Unlimited Texting and Turning off all other services that I could sign up for. My first bill didn't show that. Call #2.
They gave me phone numbers that had nothing to do with my state. Call #3.
They said "Port your number after you decide you want to keep the service". Call #4.
They fixed my out of state number with a non local number. Call #6.
They said "We can't tell if a number is local, we only match your area code...but this prefix looks local but we can't tell...Um.. Great. Call #1 for Qwest to verify the prefix for my local calling area. Call #6 to T-Mobile to get a new number.
Call #7. SPAM, Telemarking, and other annoying calls to my new T-Mobile Number. Defered because they wanted me to document the calls. Meanwhile I did not yet know my "Local#" wasn't local yet. Deferring the solution to a problem only generates more calls.
That's 7 calls so far with 8 total just to get the same account I signed up for to begin with. A simple plan, unlimited texting, and a local cell phone number.
center jobs are moving to foriegn countries at a rapid rate. I
would suggest that you move to a job that is far away from
customers because you seem jaded. Many of my friends did not
switch to AT&T because t-mobile has been so good to them. I
will not leave AT&T because one time I thought I needed a new
phone but one of there employees showed me all I needed was
a free updated sim card. Customer service is not gone it never
existed at sprint. They were my prior carrier to cingular now at&t.
Sprint had a i don't care attitude 3 years ago and they have not
changed.
Got a name,I will send it in a letter to Sprint about how you respect your customers.
While I read many c|net articles I take them with an extremely large grain of salt.
Perhaps it would help to think of them more at the journalistic level of gossip magizines...
First, an account was opened in my name with Sprint - not by me. An activation fee was charged, but as Sprint later admitted to me, no phone was ever issued, no calls were ever made, and no charges were incurred after their activation.
When I received invoices with a zero amount, I called and said there must be a mistake etc. Never got anywhere (when I wasn't getting hung up on). I was told the account could not be closed due to unnamed system reasons. Then, a couple of months later, I started getting harassing calls from a collection agency!
I explained to the collection agency again and again what had happened, that Sprint said no usage occurred etc., and the agency said (understandably) they couldn't stop calling me on my say-so; Sprint had to call them off.
So I called Sprint again and again; Sprint told me (I swear I am not making this up) that, once launched, they could not call their collection agencies back until the collection agency collected.
It took me TWO YEARS to finally get Sprint to admit that it was all their mistake, completely their fault, and to get them to close this account and call off the collectors. In that time, I must have called them many dozens of times.
So when people here and elsewhere say they don't call Sprint for fun, and call back because they're always getting disconnected - I've been there with that hellsnarl of a company. I never had any beef with them until that, but the total hostility toward me because of THEIR system glitch is something I have never experienced with any of the other carriers, and through the years I have been with almost all of the major ones.
So why don't YOU back off your attacks, and instead of accusing vaguely (ad hominem attack) say for whom you work? Sprint DOES have poor customer systems, it DOES exhibit active hostility toward account-holders, it DOES have high disconnect rates; I've been through it.
NB I am not, and never have been, affiliated with CNET or any related organization.
But true another very good way to get out of a contract, if you need to jump ship!
I personally have had a good experience with Sprint.
It's ridiculous that they're doing this now especially since AT&T just picked up ~ 700,000 new subscribers this past week.
How about other carriers policies?
Shame, cnet.
then they close with "...please call our customer care department...." I guess they don't read their own memos...
Sprint and as a former customer, would like them to burn in hell!
All of them! They've never even heard of customer service!
Verizon isn't much better though. I actually got so mad at
crapfest Verizon that I threw my phone on the ground and
destroyed it and just payed out the last two months of the
contract while I used a prepaid Cingular phone. Now I've been on
regular Cingular service for about a year and I couldn't be
happier. Well, maybe if they hadn't changed their name to AT&T.
What asshead though it was a good idea to ruin the wonderful
branding of Cingular by changing the name BACK to AT&T,
which had such a horrid reputation, they had to sell the
company just a few years ago.
"Bring in your letter for a $50 credit"
Or 20% off a new phone or something like that. This might actually help to increase the number of customer service calls to Sprint by people who would like to get out of their contract early. It's a two-fold win for other carriers, attracting new customers while hurting one of their competing companies.
The people that are calling in are the dumb ***** that cant understand their spending limit. Yeah we gave you a phone and your credit sucks but pay your bill, When you go over your minutes thats effects your spending limit and your phone gets shut off. This is so you dont screw Sprint when you rack up the bill for $1200 and then not pay, then go in the next day and use a different name and pay a $125 deposit.
About time. Good move Sprint, one of the few I have seen on your part.
Leigh
This letter seems to say "just pay it and don't bother us." That is a bad message to send to potential customers. I've been trying to decide between Verizon and Sprint for a little while. This doesn't help Sprint's case no mater how good the data connection service is.
in fact, i'm happy when they're rude because its an improvement over their usual nastiness.
How can I sign up for one!
- Sprint Used to Send Out Hit Squads
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by Sumatra-Bosch
July 5, 2007 8:44 PM PDT
- No kidding. Three or four guys would be waiting in the parking lot at work, jump the customer, beat the crap out of him and then they'd take the phone and sledge it in front of the customer on the parking lot surface.
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Reply to this comment
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- RFLMAO !!!!!
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by downshift
July 10, 2007 7:39 AM PDT
- As a former Nextel customer rep -- sure wish that this was so...........LOL
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Showing 1 of 6 pages (208 Comments)Sprint management thought the Dear John letter would be cheaper and their employees were complaining about spending their lunch breaks driving around beating people up, some of which were bigger than them.