The T-Mobile Fiasco

I got a free couple of Motorola C332's for signing up with T-Mo. Well, we found out the hard way that the battery life on those cell phones was shorter than the half-life of Einsteinium. So we did what we had to and called and complained. Surprisingly, T-Mo didn't argue the point with us and said they would be sending us a return label. When we got the two labels, I thought I would save T-Mo some money (I'm a nice guy ok!) and I would put both phones in one package and send them back with one of the two return labels. (follow my blog link to see a picture of the return label). Well before I did this incredibly stupid^H^H^H^H^H^H kind gesture, I called T-Mo to ok the money saving venture. "No problem" was the reply. You can see where this is going. A month or so later, along with our temporary phones, came a bill for $120 to replace the free, defective phone that T-Mo never got. Their whole system was automated and although there were two phones in the packet I sent to them, it was only counted as one. I must have called a dozen different times, each time a new Customer Service Rep practically accusing me of stealing from T-Mo. What was I going to do, sell that craptacular phone on Ebay. (Actually someone would have probably bought it from me, but I digress...) I actually talked to someone at the warehouse where they were receving incoming phones and had them looking for my lost phone. No luck!!! The best T-Mo could do was to "meet me half way" and only charge me $60. I was being charged for a free, defective, losted by T-Mo Ni-Cd brick! I would not give in ... it was the principle of the matter. On or around the 13th call to T-Mo the conversation went something like this:

Me: Hey, I sent in both my defective phones in one packet and thats why your system is showing that I haven't sent back the other phone.

T-Mo Rep: Oh ... ok, let me clear up this outstanding charge to your account.

Me: ... thanks! (pulling myself off the floor)

Time spent on the phone with irate reps: 8 hours
Equivalent pay lost trying to recoup my $120 charge: $200
Getting the charges waived: Priceless!!!