This is only the second time in my life that I have been so disgusted and fed up with a company that I chose to write and share the experience publicly. Yesterday, I was nearly livid upon leaving my current wireless provider because instead of rewarding loyalty, we got a big ‘screw you’ instead.
First, let me share some background. I have been with Sprint for more than a decade, through bad times and good times. At the beginning, there was always some kind of billing problem or service problem, but after a while that all seemed to get worked out. We actually went a long stretch where the service was good and there were no issues, but about six months ago that changed.
Phone calls started getting constant static and two to four times during a call, the signal would be dropped. The last few months the static has only become worse despite Sprint saying they have upgraded the service four times in our area. We’ve been to the Sprint store several times about what options were available to us, but no two salespersons gave the same information, so we are left wondering what exactly Sprint is offering and what they aren’t.
My wife’s phone is less than two years old, yet almost everything on it has quit working. Calls are not coming through, texts are not sending, and the internet has stopped working. The camera restarts the phone every time you try to use it. Sprint’s solution, pay for a refurbished phone, or be forced to upgrade plans and phones. As of this writing, Sprint has failed to fix any phone malfunction we have ever had, instead, they try to force you to upgrade everything.
Fast-forward to yesterday afternoon. We stopped in to Sprint to see about possibly updating an out of contract phone, even though the other phone on the plan is still in contract. We really were not in a position to upgrade both, since the last time we tried to do that, they tried to charge an early termination fee on the phone. We were informed that Sprint was doing away with the contract plans and moving a new “Framily” package, and if we did not switch to it now, we would have to later and be charged an extra $15 per month for waiting to switch. Exactly, a plan we have had for a while, and serves our purposes, and we wanted to keep, we were being told to either switch now or pay extra later. We were being punished for liking our plan. But it doesn’t end there.
When we told the salesperson that we were not interested in the data limits of the new plans and would remain with our old plan, she informed us that Sprint has the right to cap any data plans, even unlimited ones, at any time. She then backed off some saying that it was hearsay, but they could definitely do it and eventually would. So by now, we have been punished and threatened. Needless to say my wife and I were getting a little upset. We said we would just go to T-Mobile, the coverage is not as good, but there is no static and their customer service bends over backwards to help you. At that point we left.
The lesson we learned here is that Sprint cares nothing about loyal customers and only cares about forcing people into phones and plans that they do not need or even want. All they seem to care about is selling and making money. We are dumping Sprint, we have been tired of the degrading service for a while, but gave them the benefit of the doubt. Not anymore. Until they teach their techs how to fix things and their salespeople how to talk to customers, we will not consider ever going back to them. I was insulted to have been talked to like that and refuse to pay as much as we are for them to do that.
Think twice about going to Sprint. A good portion of their sales team is either misinformed or outright lying to customers in order to goad them into spending more money. Any company that treats customers like that should not even be in business. Sprint should be ashamed that their employees threaten caps and extra fees if you do not buy their upgrade now. I for one, am not going to pay them to be treated that poorly. The kicker is, after doing all of this, they said we could save on our upgraded plan by referring people to them. Seriously? After all the B. S. we had to endure, they think we are going to refer anyone to them? Not going to happen. In fact, they are going to lose our business and I plan on telling everyone I know about the dreadful experience with Sprint.