Customer Service Suc.....oh, wait.

There seem to be two common themes in the blogs and forums here (besides video games) - cell phone companies and bad customer service. The two seem to go hand in hand. I've been involved in customer service discussions at work and the wireless companies' call centers frequently come into the discussion as an example of the way not to do things.

I've had Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T in the last year. Dumped Verizon because of their crummy customer service, and I had to deal with Sprint's crummy customer service for nearly 5 months after I dropped them to reverse charges for services I never used and was promised I'd never be billed for. I now have AT&T and because of past experiences with their competition the bar for their customer service was already set pretty damn low.

Without going into a lengthy explanation, my wife and I use a lot of minutes on our family plan. We've exceeded the allowed minutes and incurred some crazy charges. I called yesterday to pay my bill and ask about upgrading my service so I wouldn't have to pay 45 cents for each minute that goes over the plan and figured the extra $10 a month is well worth it. So far, it's your standard run of the mill customer service call (except that the girl sounded American).

Then she blindsides me. "You are already close to going over for this current billing cycle which ends June 20, if I add it to the next billing cycle you may still have to pay additional charges for this month. Can I add it to the current billing cycle?" I said yes, of course, and that's when it happened. "We thank you for your business, if you can bear with my for a second, I'm going to reverse the charges for the 250 minutes you used last month as well, that should reduce your bill by $112.50. Do you mind holding on a moment while I do that?"

I was floored. In the past, getting a cell phone company to reverse any charges, even those resulting from the company's screw-up, required placing multiple calls, speaking with supervisors, following up, rinse and repeat. For her to actually take the initiative and have the authority to do that, is something I never would have expected. I also noticed that both of the customer service girls I spoke to yesterday ended the conversation with "Have I exceeded your expectations today?"

They say a happy customer is a silent customer, which is why you only hear horror stories about bad customer service, bad business practices, and bad products. I just felt it was worth the time to share a positive experience that I never would have expected. YMMV, but they set themselves apart from the competition in my recent experiences with them.