AT&T

Yesterday, I spent a good hour on the phone with customer service. I had a great experience on my call with AT&T wireless. I called to dispute a $53 usage charge on what is already a very hefty iPhone wireless bill. The customer service agent I spoke with was excellent. She was helpful, pleasant and courteous. She knocked off the charge, and when she didn’t know something she didn’t pretend that she did. She was both willing to ask me and her coworkers questions. Obviously I’m biased because I was able to get my bill reduced, but I like to believe I would feel the same way even if I couldn’t get the reduction on my bill. Regrettably, I didn’t write down her name. I realize too often, myself included, we voice our complaints bur rarely lavish praise. Next time I will remember to get a name when I please with service so I can actually write a letter to give praise where praise is due.

Dishnetwork

After I got off my call with AT&T, I proceeded now to the next item on my list, a call to Dishnetwork. I’m looking at potentially upgrading to HD service. I have an HD Television, and it would be nice to take advantage of that. Dishnetwork will charge me $150 to upgrade my equipment and still lock me into a 2 year commitment ontop of the of monthely equipment lease. I’m not ready for a two year commitment, and I find it somewhat incredulous given that I’m off contract that I would be charged an upgrad fee. If anything it would be cheaper for me to cancel my service, and sign up anew. More importanly, I was once again underwhelmed by Dish Network’s customer service. Of all the utilities I deal with, and all my customer service calls almost always are related to a utility, Dishnetwork has consistently had the worst customer service. I don’t blame the actual agent but rather the company. I doubt the company pays very well, nor do I think they provide adequate training. At the end of the day Dishnetwork fails to empower it’s customer service agents to actually solve customer problems. While I’ve had my difficulties with Verizon, AT&T, Comcast, and NStar (electricity), I’ve generally found the customer service agents at least try to help or resolve issue even when they fail. The customer service agents at Dishnetwork make no such effort. It’s just not in their training or directive in my opinion.