JonahWeiland.com

Two years ago I switched my mobile service from AT&T Wireless to Verizon Wireless. My contract was up with AT&T and I had decided I wanted to go cell only, giving up my home line completely. AT&T wasn’t at all interested in doing anything to keep me as a client, so I decided to jump ship since telephone number portability had just been implemented.

Two years later and my contract is up with Verizon. It’s time for a new phone. I’ve had my eye on a Palm Treo 650 for a long time, but was waiting for a good price. It’s a $400 - $500 phone, but no way am I interested in paying that when I see deals for as low as $150 when you sign a new two-year contract.

I first contacted Verizon to see what they could do for me. They could get me a Treo 650 for $200, but I’d have to sign a new two-year contract with them and buy a monthly data plan starting at a minimum of an additional $10 monthly. I really don’t need the data plan. The primary reason for my getting this phone is to integrate my Palm contact list with my phone. I hate when I leave the house without my Palm, only to discover I need a phone number in there. I don’t plan on sitting on the Internet with my Treo 650 or even checking my e-mail all that often. And even then, I plan on getting a WiFi adapter for the phone, so I can just use free WiFi instead of a data plan.

So, I began shopping around and discovered that Verizon had a deal through Buy.com which would give you a Treo 650 from them for only $125, but it’s new subscribers only. I called to see if I could get the offer extended to me – I’d sign for another two years – but they said it was for new subscribers only and I’d have to get a $15+ monthly data plan. If I wanted to get a new number, it could be done, but not if I kept the same number. Let’s count the number of ways that’s retarded. Clearly, mobile phone companies have no interest in customer retention, just new customers.

So, the choice was made. It was time to switch.

Let’sTalk.com had a couple of deals for the Treo 650 phone. Through both Cingular and Sprint you could get a Treo 650 for only $150 after mail-in rebates. I opted to go with Sprint because they had the best wireless rate plans and didn’t require me to get a data plan. Plus, I hear dealing with Cingular customer service is like trying to pay attention to you. Forget that.

The folks at Let’s Talk were quite nice to work with. My service guy, Michael, answered all my various nagging questions and gave me some helpful advice on handling the mail-in rebates. But here’s where it gets stupid.

So, my contract with Verizon expires on May 29th. Now, I ordered the phone yesterday and it’ll be shipped today, the 24th, and will arrive on the 25th. Let’s Talk must activate the new phone right before they ship it. Now, I want to keep my same mobile number as I’ve had for the last six years, so porting the phone to Sprint immediately wouldn’t work because then I’d be without a phone for a full 24 hours. That’s no good. Plus, if I port my number even one day before my contract is up with Verizon, I’ll be hit with a $175 early termination fee. I’m sorry, but one day early on a two-year contract does not qualify as early termination you fucking mongoloids! Insane levels of retardation. So here’s what we had to do.

Let’s Talk will ship my phone with an entirely new number. It’ll arrive here on the 25th with that new number. For the next five days I will basically have two mobile phone numbers. On the 30th I have to call Verizon to tell them I’m canceling my service and will be porting my number over to Sprint. Verizon will have to pro-rate me for one day of service. Then I need to call Sprint to have them port my old number to the new phone and tell them to turn off the new number. Then I need to call Let’s Talk to make sure they know everything has been taken care of, or else I loose out on a variety of rebate deals.

All this just to get the phone I want. I really thought once telephone number portability became available that the wireless phone companies would get their shit together and be more interested in customer service. Completely wrong. All they care about is increasing recurring revenue, while spending the minimum amount of time possible talking to and wooing their existing clients. Absolutely retarded.