Warning: Cingular does not check users

In April my 19 year old son decided he wanted a newer phone and approached a Cingular rep at the local Sams Club. After talking with the rep he discovered that for 60.00 he could upgrade his phone. He had the money in his pocket and knew he could pay me when he got home so he did the paperwork needed and left with his new Motorola camera phone. Thing was this was my account, my phone, my addional line. He was not an authorized person to make changes on my account.

I immediately called Cingular to complain that the rep had allowed my son to do this and they referred me to their fraud line. This of course was rediculous. I wasn't going after my own son for fraud so I backed down...until I saw the contract. He had signed it with his own name! He didn't misrepresent himself.

So I called back again. This time I got a much more reasonable person and when I explained the situation they said they would change it and everything would be cool. I waited and the next bill came in. It was high, I was busy, and I paid it without thinking. Same thing the next month. Then in the third month I noticed that I couldn't possibly have these high bills every month so I started checking and sure enough, they were charging me 90.00 per month for my son's family talk line.

Again I called to complain and get it corrected. Again I was fortunate and got a lady that took care of it, credited my account for the past two months and said it was all done. Happily I went to the local Cingular store and added a fourth line to my account for my wife.

The next month, now July, I look at the bill and again it's high. I look at the detail and again they have my sons line on a separate contract. I call again and this time I get a yahoo that tells me I can't make the change because my main plan isn't availale anymore. They transfer me to "customer service". I thought that's who I was talking to.

On the line with customer service I go through the whole story about my son, the credits and trying to get it straigtened out. She tells me I can't change and to talk to the fraud department. This time I'm ready and tell her he didn't misrepresent himself and that the cingular rep was responsible to allowing someone not authorized to make a change to my account.

She argued with me about how many minutes and plans I should have with four phones and I was forced to tell her I wasn't interested before she would proceed. Now 4 months after my kid did something stupid and Cingular let him I again think I have it resolved....but since the call yesterday my coverage has gone almost completely away in areas that were fine the day, or weeks before....Coincidence? I don't know but it certainly makes me think.

So beware and make certain your kids know that if they want to pay for a new phone to just wait and talk to mom and dad.

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Originally Posted by Stormspace

In April my 19 year old son decided he wanted a newer phone and approached a Cingular rep at the local Sams Club. After talking with the rep he discovered that for 60.00 he could upgrade his phone. He had the money in his pocket and knew he could pay me when he got home so he did the paperwork needed and left with his new Motorola camera phone. Thing was this was my account, my phone, my addional line.........

Dang, that is not right! I have noticed something about cingular that I don't like....Anyone that knows your number can call cingular 611 or whatever and put the number in and with the zip code as verification they can check minutes,bills,ect which to me is too easy and not RIGHT....I mean heck anyone can get a zip at a drop of a hat,kwim?

Sorry to hear that you had so much trouble. It seems that lots of people had had trouble with Cingular and their costumer service. I have been with ATT for 5 years then migrated to Cingular about 6 months or so ago and havn't had any problems.

Well, good luck with getting that mess resolved!!!

You should have gone back to the store that sold your son the phone. You have a 30 day return/exchange period. You didn't have to report this to fraud (against your son). Each store has a manager. Why deal with customer service that is based 2000 miles away from where you are, have to explain the whole situation, etc when you can go & talk to the place that caused the problem. Let them fix their problem.

While yes, shame on Cingular for allowing this to happen, it was that 1 rep, who is an employee of Sam's Club, who screwed up. What a generalizing claim to make, that cingular as a company does this. Customer service won't let someone inquire about ANYTHING without full account verification. Trust me, this pisses people off too. You should have gone back to or called the place where the phone was purchased. PERIOD.

As for the 2nd run-in with the rate plan, contact the rep that added your 4th line. Go into that store. Customer service won't do anything they are not allowed to do. They get in trouble for puting people on grandfathered plans when they get audited. SO, once again, go into that store, talk to the rep, talk to the manager. They can help you. They can contact their local district manager to push a grandfathered plan through. Make it their problem to solve. I can tell you what probably happened with the plan, but that would take too long & really you just want it fixed. It is nothing that was done intentionally by the rep, but you need to go back to that rep. Call the store & find out when they work next, or set up a time to meet with the manager.

[QUOTE=Stormspace]
....but since the call yesterday my coverage has gone almost completely away in areas that were fine the day, or weeks before....Coincidence? I don't know but it certainly makes me think.
QUOTE]

I think you are giving some of these bonehead customer service reps too much credit. they can't decrease service on just your phone. and why would they? to piss you off more? its not like you were being unreasonable by asking the mistakes to be fixed time after time.... You must be having a tower or phone problem. Has there been a big storm? Have you ever gotten your phone wet? Have you asked other Cingular customers if they are experiencing the same problems in those areas? .....

Originally Posted by sjwilson

You should have gone back to the store that sold your son the phone. You have a 30 day return/exchange period. You didn't have to report this to fraud (against your son). Each store has a manager. Why deal with customer service that is based 2000 miles away from where you are, have to explain the whole situation, etc when you can go & talk to the place that caused the problem. Let them fix their problem.

While yes, shame on Cingular for allowing this to happen, it was that 1 rep, who is an employee of Sam's Club, who screwed up. What a generalizing claim to make, that cingular as a company does this. Customer service won't let someone inquire about ANYTHING without full account verification. Trust me, this pisses people off too. You should have gone back to or called the place where the phone was purchased. PERIOD.

While I did call Cingular CS first, I did call the Sams Club and talk to the manager where I discovered that the Cingular reps are not Sams employees. So when I approached the reps later that week they neither offered to do anything to correct the situation, nor did they apologize for the screw up.

Originally Posted by sjwilson

As for the 2nd run-in with the rate plan, contact the rep that added your 4th line. Go into that store. Customer service won't do anything they are not allowed to do. They get in trouble for puting people on grandfathered plans when they get audited. SO, once again, go into that store, talk to the rep, talk to the manager. They can help you. They can contact their local district manager to push a grandfathered plan through. Make it their problem to solve. I can tell you what probably happened with the plan, but that would take too long & really you just want it fixed. It is nothing that was done intentionally by the rep, but you need to go back to that rep. Call the store & find out when they work next, or set up a time to meet with the manager.

To me this didn't seem to be that stores problem since it was a preexisting issue before I got the fourth phone...

[QUOTE=Stormspace]
....but since the call yesterday my coverage has gone almost completely away in areas that were fine the day, or weeks before....Coincidence? I don't know but it certainly makes me think.
QUOTE]

Originally Posted by sjwilson

I think you are giving some of these bonehead customer service reps too much credit. they can't decrease service on just your phone. and why would they? to piss you off more? its not like you were being unreasonable by asking the mistakes to be fixed time after time.... You must be having a tower or phone problem. Has there been a big storm? Have you ever gotten your phone wet? Have you asked other Cingular customers if they are experiencing the same problems in those areas? .....

As for the coverage. I have four..count em. 1, 2, 3, 4 phones. All new as I have recently upgraded each of differing manufaturers. Motorola, LG, 2 Samsung of differing models. All of them have the same coverage issues. If it's anything its a defective tower near the house. The most recent coverage issue is likely a tower problem, but we have been having severe issues since the merger with AT&T.

As for that 30 day thing. It was never mentioned by any of the reps I dealt with, so I'm not certain that it applied and if it did they were negligent in not mentioning it once I called.

If you have to, threaten to take them to court, that might get them to be more eager to help...lol

Originally Posted by Superman!

If you have to, threaten to take them to court, that might get them to be more eager to help...lol

Like I said. At this point I think the issue is resolved. I was just posting to help others that might be going through the same thing.

While I did call Cingular CS first, I did call the Sams Club and talk to the manager where I discovered that the Cingular reps are not Sams employees. So when I approached the reps later that week they neither offered to do anything to correct the situation, nor did they apologize for the screw up.

What did you ask them to do? Did you ask to return the phone & cancel the unauthorized contract? Did you ask to speak to the manager? After reading my previous post, I hope you don't think that I am saying you did anything wrong. The reps you dealt with certainly screwed up, and if they did not do anything to correct the problem, I am sorry for your trouble as I know customer service is not always easy to deal with.

To me this didn't seem to be that stores problem since it was a preexisting issue before I got the fourth phone...

True, I must have misunderstood your previous post. I thought the problem was resolved through customer service, then when you purchased the 4th phone the plan was screwed up again.

As for the coverage. I have four..count em. 1, 2, 3, 4 phones. All new as I have recently upgraded each of differing manufaturers. Motorola, LG, 2 Samsung of differing models. All of them have the same coverage issues. If it's anything its a defective tower near the house. The most recent coverage issue is likely a tower problem, but we have been having severe issues since the merger with AT&T.

I agree, I do think it is a coverage or tower issue. I never said it wasn't. You said "since the call yesterday..." The way you stated your original claim implied that your coverage was altered due to your recent problems with Cingular. That is what I was replying to...

As for that 30 day thing. It was never mentioned by any of the reps I dealt with, so I'm not certain that it applied and if it did they were negligent in not mentioning it once I called.

True, they may have been negligent. I guess I am confused about what you wanted to do....

Did you not want a contract on your son's line? If that was the case, did you ask or instruct the reps to cancel the contract (provided you return the phone)?

Or were you just upset that they were negligent and allowed your son to sign the contract, but wanted to let him keep the phone/contract?

Originally Posted by Stormspace

Like I said. At this point I think the issue is resolved. I was just posting to help others that might be going through the same thing.

I guess I didn't catch that you said it is resolved up until this post..... seemed like it was unresolved after reading your initial post. sorry for dragging it on

Originally Posted by sjwilson

Did you not want a contract on your son's line? If that was the case, did you ask or instruct the reps to cancel the contract (provided you return the phone)?

Or were you just upset that they were negligent and allowed your son to sign the contract, but wanted to let him keep the phone/contract?

Well, I didn't want a contract on my son's line, but he wanted the phone and after doing some online checking he was eligiable for one without signing a new contract. But when I was making the original calls I didn't know this and was reluctant to ask for the contract to be canceled and the phone returned, so I never mentioned it. I just wanted the contract canceled and for him to keep the phone. And again after checking online that account was eligiable for a free upgrade anyway, or a reduced price for a new phone so in retrospcect I don't think I was asking for much.

Don't they require the last 4 numbers of the account holder's social? They did when I wanted to do anything with my mom's plan (although they did let me sign, I had to call and get the social). Granted, that was 2-3 years ago.

Originally Posted by Stormspace

Well, I didn't want a contract on my son's line, but he wanted the phone and after doing some online checking he was eligiable for one without signing a new contract. But when I was making the original calls I didn't know this and was reluctant to ask for the contract to be canceled and the phone returned, so I never mentioned it. I just wanted the contract canceled and for him to keep the phone. And again after checking online that account was eligiable for a free upgrade anyway, or a reduced price for a new phone so in retrospcect I don't think I was asking for much.

Well, actually there is no such thing as a 'free upgrade.' Upgrade = contract. This is probably where some of the confusion came from.

I just wanted the contract canceled and for him to keep the phone.

Well, the price of a phone without a contract, for example, is $179.99 (hypothetical example, not necessarily the phone your son purchased). When you sign a 1 year contract, the price is reduced to $119.99. When you sign a 2 year contract, the price is 69.99.

Now, Sam's club (or the owner of the independent location) most likely pays a hypothetical $150 for the phone. They get reimbursed for the phone by Cingular the following month via commission based on the 1 or 2 year contract. The store would not have paid $150 for the phone, then turned around and sold it for $70 without a contract. Thats an $80 hit.

Unfortunately, thats how the wireless industry works. All advertised prices are with a service contract. Always. Otherwise, you must pay retail price for the phone, which is more like $100 and up, not the advertised 'free' and '$59.99' prices.

Originally Posted by BrianSkibinski

Don't they require the last 4 numbers of the account holder's social? They did when I wanted to do anything with my mom's plan (although they did let me sign, I had to call and get the social). Granted, that was 2-3 years ago.

Interestingly enough, I didn't give it to him and I doubt he knows it. I don't think they asked, but I could be wrong. He did sign his own name to the agreement though, which is fortunte for me sicne he didn't misrepresent himself.

Originally Posted by sjwilson

Well, actually there is no such thing as a 'free upgrade.' Upgrade = contract. This is probably where some of the confusion came from.


Well, the price of a phone without a contract, for example, is $179.99 (hypothetical example, not necessarily the phone your son purchased). When you sign a 1 year contract, the price is reduced to $119.99. When you sign a 2 year contract, the price is 69.99.

Now, Sam's club (or the owner of the independent location) most likely pays a hypothetical $150 for the phone. They get reimbursed for the phone by Cingular the following month via commission based on the 1 or 2 year contract. The store would not have paid $150 for the phone, then turned around and sold it for $70 without a contract. Thats an $80 hit.

Unfortunately, thats how the wireless industry works. All advertised prices are with a service contract. Always. Otherwise, you must pay retail price for the phone, which is more like $100 and up, not the advertised 'free' and '$59.99' prices.

Yeah, the phone in question was 69.99 with an additional two year committment with no change in contract terms, basically 9.99/month with taxes and stuff. The terms he got were substantially different to the tune of 90.00/month.

Yes, we have established that they screwed up the plan. But that was fixed, right? Nowadays the contract does not lock you into a plan, and you are absolutely correct that the plan should have stayed the same unless a request was made for the plan to be changed, or unless the plan's technology did not sync.

I just wanted the contract canceled and for him to keep the phone. And again after checking online that account was eligiable for a free upgrade anyway, or a reduced price for a new phone so in retrospcect I don't think I was asking for much.

So, this would have been possible if you would have paid the difference between retail price & 2yr price when cancelling the contract.