Do not ever sign up with Sprint

Over so many years of cell phone experience, I have used T-Mobile, AT&T, Sprint and Now Verizon. Sprint is by far, yes--BY FAR, the worst I have ever had. Other companies have their pros and cons, but Sprint only has cons without pros. I will list my issues from minor to major here:

1. Sprint offered paperless statements by sending you emails and to encourage the usage of paperless statements, they offered $5 discount on my next bill. I happily signed up, not just for the $5,but to save paper. Over each of the three following billing cycles, I found my bill without the $5 discount and called the customer service and was promised the discount on my next bill. I never got that and I gave up. I just didn't want to waste my time over $5. It's just pathetic that a big company like Sprint would cling to a tiny $5 it promised to its customers.

2. I always got my message 12 to 36 hours late, and the missed calllist did not show that somebody called until too late. I often got the accusation that I do not return calls.

3. This is major. I signed up with Sprint through a promotion and with a one year contract--yes one year! The store contract says it is one year, but the sprint contract did not specify agreement period. Technically, I could switch company the day after I signed up. Well, I switched much later than that-- more than a year and half--and see what I got--a charge of $700 early termination fee (for three phones). I had several frustrating calls with the customer services. As you know, you always have to wait more than 10minutes before you can talk to somebody, and they keep switching you to somebody else who would ask you to tell your story again. Finally, I digged through piles of documentations and found my contract, went to a sprint store as instructed, and showed them the contract. After a one-hour frustrating call together with the store manager who witnessed the contract over the phone with customer service--I still did not get the $700 fee waived. I had no choice but file a complaint with FCC.

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Originally Posted by zhbuyi

Over so many years of cell phone experience, I have used T-Mobile, AT&T, Sprint and Now Verizon. Sprint is by far, yes--BY FAR, the worst I have ever had. Other companies have their pros and cons, but Sprint only has cons without pros. I will list my issues from minor to major here:

1. Sprint offered paperless statements by sending you emails and to encourage the usage of paperless statements, they offered $5 discount on my next bill. I happily signed up, not just for the $5,but to save paper. Over each of the three following billing cycles, I found my bill without the $5 discount and called the customer service and was promised the discount on my next bill. I never got that and I gave up. I just didn't want to waste my time over $5. It's just pathetic that a big company like Sprint would cling to a tiny $5 it promised to its customers.

2. I always got my message 12 to 36 hours late, and the missed calllist did not show that somebody called until too late. I often got the accusation that I do not return calls.

3. This is major. I signed up with Sprint through a promotion and with a one year contract--yes one year! The store contract says it is one year, but the sprint contract did not specify agreement period. Technically, I could switch company the day after I signed up. Well, I switched much later than that-- more than a year and half--and see what I got--a charge of $700 early termination fee (for three phones). I had several frustrating calls with the customer services. As you know, you always have to wait more than 10minutes before you can talk to somebody, and they keep switching you to somebody else who would ask you to tell your story again. Finally, I digged through piles of documentations and found my contract, went to a sprint store as instructed, and showed them the contract. After a one-hour frustrating call together with the store manager who witnessed the contract over the phone with customer service--I still did not get the $700 fee waived. I had no choice but file a complaint with FCC.

I dont work for Sprint but here's my thoughts on your issues:
1. never heard of it.
2. may have been your phone
3. If you made any changes to the initial contract, your clock may have been restarted.

I seriously doubt they charged you $700 ETF, for 3 phones. I mean..sprint has a bad reception around where I live ( I only have it cause I get monthly discount ), I have had bad experience w/ them too. But when it comes to ETF they WILL CHARGE YOU $200 per phone. $200 even, no tax, total of $600 for 3. So theres something wrong here. Maybe they are charging your last bill.

Originally Posted by iden364

I seriously doubt they charged you $700 ETF, for 3 phones. I mean..sprint has a bad reception around where I live ( I only have it cause I get monthly discount ), I have had bad experience w/ them too. But when it comes to ETF they WILL CHARGE YOU $200 per phone. $200 even, no tax, total of $600 for 3. So theres something wrong here. Maybe they are charging your last bill.

I understand perfectly what they are charging. My last bill was about $106, not included in the $703--and that's another story I did not tell. The amount of 106 is more than what I normally pay and I can I understand it because we made a lot of phone calls in the last month. As you know I signed up for paperless statements, and do not receive paper bills. After I switch to Verizon, I was not able to sign into my account to view my statements--and that's fine too. But I would like to see what I am being charged. So, I called Sprint to ask them to send me a paper bill so everything is clear. You know what they said--"We are going to charge you $5 for that"--Give me a break, I forego the $5 Sprint owe me and now I simply want one copy of my statement and they are charging me? I have never heard of any company (no matter what trade) charge a customer for printout of a statement.

They are just Greedy!

Originally Posted by camstuf

I dont work for Sprint but here's my thoughts on your issues:

1. never heard of it.

--Well, now you have heard it.

2. may have been your phone:

--Don't understand

3. If you made any changes to the initial contract, your clock may have been restarted.

--Could be, I signed up for an employee discount program. I asked them about it, and they said no. However, shouldn't they let me let me know if the clock has restarted and my expiration date has changed?

yeah..its stupid that they charge you for a printout statement. WTF?? it should be free, EVERYONE else does it.

Originally Posted by zhbuyi

--Could be, I signed up for an employee discount program. I asked them about it, and they said no. However, shouldn't they let me let me know if the clock has restarted and my expiration date has changed?

read the fine print

I agree sprint is horrible. I live in baton rouge and I cant take it!

I HEAR YOU ON THAT ONE!!! I HATE SPRINT, THERE CUSTOMER SERVICE SUCKS, MY PLAN WAS ALWAYS GETTING CHANGED. I HAD TO CALL THEN AT LEASE 4,5 TIMES A MONTH TO MAKE SURE THEY WERENT GOING TO SHUT OFF MY PHONE FOR GOING OVER THE SPENDING LIMIT. THEY CHARGE TO MUCH FOR SUCH ****Y SERVICE. WHEN I FIRST GOT MY SERVICE THEY TOLD ME THAT IT WOULD COST ME THE SAME AMOUNT TO CLOSE MY ACCOUNT THAT I PAID TO GET THE ACCOUNT. I TRIED TO CLOSE IT JUST A FEW WEEKS AGO AND THEY WERE GOING TO CHARGE ME $250. FROM $150 TO THAT!!!! WOW SO NOW IM STUCK TILL MY CONTRACT IS UP, WHICH THEY HAVE ALSO ADDED 4 MONTHS LONGER. I HATE SPRINT AND I WOULD NEVER RECOMEND ANYONE TO GET A NEW SERVICE WITH THEM. I WOULD NEVER LET ANYONE I KNOW GET AN ACCOUNT WITH THEM.

My first cell was a cingular (back then pacbell) when I was a freshman in high school, It was all great, I even worked for them, but the kiosk next to us would ALWAYS sell more we did cause they sold Sprint, their biggest help was LOWER DEPOSIT, when a cingular or Tmobile customer had to leave $800deposit (back then, I bet its lower now) a Sprint customer had to leave $250 and boom..we lost a sale right there. Man how I used to hate that. It got to a point that I applied at Sprint, and I was making $$$$ . When I was there, of course I had to call customer service and dealer support for many situations and I noticed that their service was really bad, i'll be on the phone for like 30mins and then *click* those mother #$%$ would hang up (I never saw this when I was with Cingular). Man. It was so bad that I would never get a phone from them (I still had my old Cingular phone), Til they offered me a discount then I got one. It drops calls it also had bad reception in some places but I AGREED TO A CONTRACT. IF I DID NOT READ THE FINE PRINT, I CANT BLAME NO ONE BUT MYSELF.
I tried selling Verizon, Tmobile..and I noticed that I did not sell as much as Sprint phones.

Sprint is in business because of people who dont want to leave deposit, dont want to leave as much deposit, or even if you dont want to leave your SS#. Now why would people dont want to leave a SS#? because the deposit will be lower (estimated deposit w/out ss# $150), and also cause theres a bunch of people without SS# around too. I see that Sprint has a lot of business around my area, and Its gotten to a point were I am working on becoming a Sprint Dealer. My job will be to show customers the coverage map, the rateplan, their minutes and their selected plan, and provide good customer service (something I dont see in these local dealers).