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Thursday, 27 May 2004

Phone companies [muz]

In case you couldn't tell by the topic, this blog is about the scum of the earth, otherwise known as mobile phone companies. Now, some of you may be aware of my ongoing battle with T-Mobile - it essentially boils down to their being inept, and then covering their ineptitude by sending customers round infinite voicemail loops. Well, finally, things got to be too much, and I called them and requested a PAC number. The conversation went something like this:
Customer service rep: 'I'll just put you through to our customer management team.' Me (wanting to avoid a 30 minute conversation about 'Why are you leaving' and 'What we can offer you if you stay'): 'Er no, thanks. I'd just like a PAC number sent out, thank you.' Customer service rep (in an irritated fashion): 'Yes, sir, customer management will have to deal with that.' What the fuck?! I'm leaving because of shit service, and they think that being rude to me will somehow induce me to stay? Genius. And the thought that a customer service rep can't click on the icon that says 'Send PAC number' is somewhat ludicrous, too.
After a 20 minute conversation with a customer manager, who was actually quite polite, I managed to convince her that there was no chance I was going to stay with T-Mobile. She then pointed out that if I waited until the 18th June, to request a PAC number, I wouldn't have to pay the early termination fee of some 15 notes. Now, faced with this dilemma of principle versus pecuniary saving, I took the only correct choice. I said I'd call back on the 18th. Damn these underhand, conniving people.
Anyway, I went ahead and ordered a Nokia 6820 from O2. Handset was free on a £30/month contract, which includes 200 cross network minutes, 500 free texts, 500 WAP minutes, and 0.5MB of GPRS traffic. (Depending on how much I use, I may add one of their GPRS bolt-ons to my tariff.) All very reasonable. Call up O2, as instructed, to discuss eventual porting of my existing number, and am told by the customer service monkey that the 6820 is out of stock, and it wouldn't be delivered for tree to four weeks, as opposed to the 'next three days' displayed on my invoice. FFS! I bleet at them a bit and then hang up, not overly impressed. What should turn up the next morning but a suspicious package with 'O2' on the side. Madness. In summary, don't trust what mobile phone customer service reps tell you. Ever.
Expect a blog on the phone in a couple of weeks, after I've been using it a while.

8 comments:

  1. just as a matter of interest, what attracted you to the 6820, its a fairly ugly phone with possibly the worst camera ever and iffy battery life.

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  2. He wanted a pointless ugly looking device with a full keyboard. Like yours no?

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  3. Main draws were XHTML and full keyboard - I do nothing but text, and predictive/repeat input hacks me off. I looked at their previous full keybord model, but it looked shit.
    As for the 6820, it's no more ugly than the 6600, for example, and realy, who cares what other people think of what your phone looks like? I couldn't care less about the camera, would have got the 6810, but the 20 was free with the tariff I wanted. As for battery life, even if it doesn't live up to the 7 hours talk/10 days standby, I will almost always been in range of a charger, be it mains or car. Mneh.

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  4. Not really, since they keyboard on mine isn't and it's not ugly like that nokia either.

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  5. Um, you have by far and away the ugliest phone of anyone in EED - even including Muz. I also fail to see why your keyboard is any less pointless than his.
    As for the camera stuff, yeah. Who buys one for the camera in it? The fuckers just put them in it whether you want it or not. As for all the keyboard shit... fucks up sending text with one hand doesn't it. You've gotta fold it out?

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  6. Mine is much less pointless because it doesn't need to be folded out and i can still send text with one hand fine, a damn sight quicker than on a standard phone too.

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  7. Yeah, fair point, but I can still use the keypad to send messages if I've only got one hand free.
    Main reason for the keyboard for me is that 1) I don't do abbreviations, and 2) I'm much quicker on a QWERTY than I am texting. (Predictive or not). Ho hum.

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  8. Predictive text means you don't have to do abbreviations. Nokias even do punctuation. I actually text faster than I used to enter text on a PDA. Then again, that's all personal preference.
    I'm not going to get into the gadget race with mobile phones because virtually all of the current phones fuck me off. Shitty over complicated menus and wanky colour screens which are invisible in broad daylight. Not to mention the wank battery life.
    I'll take a look at phones again when OLED displays arrive.

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