Breach of Contract?

I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my
primary means of communication. I have no land line. My service is
usually ok in much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my
home it is terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5
minutes. Some places in my home I can stand very, very still and
maintain a signal for some time but I cannot move at all or I will lose
the signal and my conversation will end. Is this sufficient
justification to claim breach of contract with Cingular? I have
complained to Cingular on more than one occasion about this and have
been told to use a signal booster or that I should be patient or that no
service is perfect, etc. I personally believe that if I am paying them
then my phone should work at my home. I would even be willing to accept
an occasional outage or signal drop as a weakness of the technology but
not to the point that it makes the service useless to me.

Any advice, information would be appreciated.

Thanks,
-Mark

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"Mark Faine" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my
> primary means of communication. I have no land line. My service is
> usually ok in much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my
> home it is terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5
> minutes. Some places in my home I can stand very, very still and
> maintain a signal for some time but I cannot move at all or I will lose
> the signal and my conversation will end. Is this sufficient
> justification to claim breach of contract with Cingular?

Not unless you started your contract while you were living somewhere else.
There is a free trial period that comes with every new contract. THIS
specific issue is the reason for it. If you had poor signal strength at
home, you should have returned the phone within the trial period. Then you
should have tried a different provider. -Dave

All I know is that Cingular Sucks. Get out while you can. I here
Verizon has pretty good signal. Cingular sucks all around. They have
terrible customer support. They will lie to you to get a sale and then
won't back up the bs they used to sell you the contract. I hope
everyone boycots them soon. Right now I stuck with $800 in roaming
charges in an area they told me I was covered in my contract and there
was never any indication transmitted to the phone. I have 2 phones
with them and according to them if I had the other phone I wouldn't
have been roaming. Even though the 1st phone never said roaming when
"it apparently was". At&t was great, but after Cingular got ahold of
them they f all the AT&T customers.

After several hours and them hanging up on me several times. Their
"customer care" said that they didn't even have my contract on file but
that I should just pay the bill and we could all be friends, f that.

Maybe if they cut me a check for $800, I'll stop telling people the
truth, too.

Cingular Sucks, Stay Away. And have a nice day

What is this about a signal booster? To my knowledge no such thing exists.

Fred

"Mark Faine" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my primary
>means of communication. I have no land line. My service is usually ok in
>much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my home it is
>terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5 minutes. Some places
>in my home I can stand very, very still and maintain a signal for some time
>but I cannot move at all or I will lose the signal and my conversation will
>end. Is this sufficient justification to claim breach of contract with
>Cingular? I have complained to Cingular on more than one occasion about
>this and have been told to use a signal booster or that I should be patient
>or that no service is perfect, etc. I personally believe that if I am
>paying them then my phone should work at my home. I would even be willing
>to accept an occasional outage or signal drop as a weakness of the
>technology but not to the point that it makes the service useless to me.
>
> Any advice, information would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> -Mark

Mark Faine wrote:
> I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my
> primary means of communication. I have no land line. My service is
> usually ok in much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my
> home it is terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5
> minutes. Some places in my home I can stand very, very still and
> maintain a signal for some time but I cannot move at all or I will lose
> the signal and my conversation will end. Is this sufficient
> justification to claim breach of contract with Cingular?

Sorry, no. Neither Cingular, nor any other wireless provider,
guarantees any particular level of service in any particular locale.
The fine print in your contract explains this, and specifically grants
you the right to terminate your contract within a grace period. It
wouldn've helped to learn this early enough to have that advantage.

> I have
> complained to Cingular on more than one occasion about this and have
> been told to use a signal booster or that I should be patient or that no
> service is perfect, etc. I personally believe that if I am paying them
> then my phone should work at my home. I would even be willing to accept
> an occasional outage or signal drop as a weakness of the technology but
> not to the point that it makes the service useless to me.

Weakness of the technology also dictates that whichever tower that
supplies the signal could go away at any time (see above). I wouldn't
lose the CSR phone number of the landline provider just yet, you may
need it just after your next 911 call.

>
> Any advice, information would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> -Mark


--
jer
email reply - I am not a 'ten'

Fred wrote:

>What is this about a signal booster? To my knowledge no such thing exists.
>
>
You can buy professional signal boosters that work, generally an active
repeater/antenna system. They are not "cheap" though, they usually cost
between $400 and $800 AFAIK.

TH

Wireless service providers do not guaranty coverage inside buildings
period. They do not even guaranty coverage outside in every square
block of their coverage area. My advice is to get a land line.
Hopefully you can get a land line provider that does not charge too
much. My monthly bill including taxes averages around $16.

Mark Faine wrote:
> I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my
> primary means of communication. I have no land line. My service is
> usually ok in much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my
> home it is terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5
> minutes. Some places in my home I can stand very, very still and
> maintain a signal for some time but I cannot move at all or I will lose
> the signal and my conversation will end. Is this sufficient
> justification to claim breach of contract with Cingular? I have
> complained to Cingular on more than one occasion about this and have
> been told to use a signal booster or that I should be patient or that no
> service is perfect, etc. I personally believe that if I am paying them
> then my phone should work at my home. I would even be willing to accept
> an occasional outage or signal drop as a weakness of the technology but
> not to the point that it makes the service useless to me.
>
> Any advice, information would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> -Mark

Yes, I agree with Dave. MOBILE Phone service is not perfect, and if you
wanted something that always works in your house or basement, it is called a
land-line. Mobile phones work in "most places", but not all. The cellular
booster from wilson is your best improvement choice at home. dr
--
dr.news Better Price? (not better than you deserve, just more than you are
used to)
If I can help: [email protected]te-the-obvious or thru this
notes forum.
home of the better priced phone and service:
http://free.better-price.biz

"Dave C." <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Mark Faine" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my
>> primary means of communication. I have no land line. My service is
>> usually ok in much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my
>> home it is terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5
>> minutes. Some places in my home I can stand very, very still and
>> maintain a signal for some time but I cannot move at all or I will lose
>> the signal and my conversation will end. Is this sufficient
>> justification to claim breach of contract with Cingular?
>
> Not unless you started your contract while you were living somewhere else.
> There is a free trial period that comes with every new contract. THIS
> specific issue is the reason for it. If you had poor signal strength at
> home, you should have returned the phone within the trial period. Then
> you
> should have tried a different provider. -Dave
>
>

The fine print of every cell contract states that service is not guaranteed
even within posted coverage areas. That's why most carriers offer 14 to 30
day money back guarantees.

That being said... if you employ a lawyer to write a stern letter to
Cingular, chances are you'll get out of it penalty free. Cingular doesn't
want trouble, so they will react to a lawyer's letter. Losing a termination
fee just isn't worth a possible lawsuit to them. Many lawyers have their
assistants write these type of letters for a nominal fee... $50 to $100.
Also works out great if you have a lawyer in the family or know one well.
Might be worth it to you.

"Mark Faine" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...

> Any advice, information would be appreciated.

"Mark Faine" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...
> I have service with Cingular wireless and I use this service as my
> primary means of communication. I have no land line. My service is
> usually ok in much of the city where I live (Huntsville, AL) but at my
> home it is terrible. I cannot maintain a signal for more than 5
> minutes. Some places in my home I can stand very, very still and
> maintain a signal for some time but I cannot move at all or I will lose
> the signal and my conversation will end. Is this sufficient
> justification to claim breach of contract with Cingular? I have
> complained to Cingular on more than one occasion about this and have
> been told to use a signal booster or that I should be patient or that no
> service is perfect, etc. I personally believe that if I am paying them
> then my phone should work at my home. I would even be willing to accept
> an occasional outage or signal drop as a weakness of the technology but
> not to the point that it makes the service useless to me.
>
> Any advice, information would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> -Mark
>
If it used to work fine at your home but then stopped working
because of some change that Cingular made (e.g., removing a
tower), then you should at least have a good case for getting
the early termination fee waived. Don't expect more.

"rfredericks" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> The fine print of every cell contract states that service is not
guaranteed
> even within posted coverage areas. That's why most carriers offer 14 to 30
> day money back guarantees.
>
> That being said... if you employ a lawyer to write a stern letter to
> Cingular, chances are you'll get out of it penalty free. Cingular doesn't
> want trouble, so they will react to a lawyer's letter. Losing a
termination
> fee just isn't worth a possible lawsuit to them. Many lawyers have their
> assistants write these type of letters for a nominal fee... $50 to $100.
> Also works out great if you have a lawyer in the family or know one well.
> Might be worth it to you.
>
> "Mark Faine" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>
> > Any advice, information would be appreciated.
>
>


Hmmm. I don't think so. I think that in a Court of Law when the terms and
conditions are introduced, and it gets to the part in the terms and
conditions where it says that Cingular can not and will not guarantee
service in all areas (as mentioned above) then any lawyer who is any good is
going to advise you to pay the termination fee and chalk it up to
experience.