AT&T Customer Service

I think I have a new candidate for most useless website. It is so useless in fact that I was forced to use the telephone to deal with a phone company. Go figure? I would have been better off lecturing second graders on thermodynamics than trying to get anywhere with these people. Who doesn't love being on the phone for over an hour, explaining your dilemma to every Tom that Dick tranfers you over to since Harry cannot be bothered with helping you. I mean, it's only his job, right? Then just as you think you are making progress the line goes dead and you hear nothing but dial tone. Grrrrrrrrrr!

You see, my cell phone was stolen out of my vehicle because for once in my life I gave the benefit of the doubt to some Tony Hawk wanna-be skateboarding riff-raff who proceeded to violate my trust and rob me. If those punks don't think I will get them back then they are sadly mistaken, but I digress.... My next move is to report my phone stolen, thereby rendering my online account unusable because I may not be me, even though I am indeed me and can answer every foolish security question imaginable. My first phone call was to remedy this lockout situation, which a better use of my time would have been standing on a soapbox and reciting to my cats from the greatest hits of T.S.Eliot. The follow-up phone calls were equally a colossal waste of time. How hard is it for a live customer service representative to provide for me the same offer their own company is making online to customers just like myself? Apparently pretty goddamned hard?

So I make the decision to go to the actual AT&T store in the hopes of talking to a representative a bit more responsive than a loaf of bread. Fortunately for me I manage to proceed with little fanfare and buy a new phone (which online was friggin' free, but beggars can't be choosers at this point.) I walk out of the store with all kinds of shit I don't need because it seemed like such a good deal at the time. After a few weeks I get my first new bill and thankfully there was a ceiling above me to keep me out of Earth orbit. I am signed up for every damn thing that I refused at the point of sale. I've got massive text messaging capacity, deluxe internet access, insurance more expensive than the phone, a plan twice as expensive as the one I thought I was renewing, not to mention that they never told me the phone I bought was buy one get one free and my wife could have had a new phone as well. I felt so sorry for the poor sap that was about to have the misfortune of seeing me coming through the store front door with no regard for others' perception of my public persona.

The thing about cell phone stores is that they are very unlike most other businesses. If you complain a little then your bill will go down a little. If you complain a lot then your bill will go down a lot. If you outright bitch at the top of your lungs then they give you phones, huge rate plan discounts, free accessories, ringtones and pretty much anything that will shut you up and get your ass out of their store before you expose their operation for the ruse that it is. I love it when a plan comes together...lol. So now I have two new LG Shine phones that get barely one bar in my house, and have batteries that need charging once like every two days. At least I didn't pay an arm and a leg for them though. Well actually I did but I sent in a mail-in rebate so I'll be getting the leg back in six to eight weeks.