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juldeaShort version for the tl;dr folks: my current AT&T cell phone bill is non-ideal, and my two plans for fixing this are either switching to another company (T-Mobile is who I've checked out for prices) or haggling with AT&T to try to get them to cut a deal to keep me. I'm soliciting advice on either of these plans.
When I moved to Massachusetts 6 years ago, I signed up with then-Cingular for a pretty awesome at the time combo mp3-player/phone. Over the past 6 years, I have upgraded only once, from that phone to my current Treo 650. Only the first phone had a 2-year contract; the past 4 years have been pay-as-I-go. The only problem I've ever had has been a technical failure on the phone itself, which was solved by by-that-time-AT&T quickly and quite easily to me. I still have the base phone plan I started with 6 years ago! When I got the Treo I added a data and messaging plan to my bill, and it has done quite well by me until recently.
I use very, very few actual phone minutes. The base plan I started with 6 years ago is still excessive: 250 daytime minutes and unlimited nights and weekends for $37/mo. The past few months I've used 119 (day)/223 (night/wkd), 51/317, 38/171, and 92/518. I really don't need a high-minutes voice plan.
The features plan I got for my Treo back in the day started out with a limit on both data and messaging, but I found that with the cool things I could do with my phone (IRC, Google Maps, web browsing, email) I was consistently going over on data, so I upgraded to unlimited data + 200 msgs/month for $20. This is the plan I still have, though it has been phased out as an option for new clients.
This means that my monthly bill should be $57+taxes.
---
Texting has kind of taken off. I don't even pipe Twitter to my phone (though sometimes I use it to tweet out), but the various ways in which text messages are useful have become evident on my bill. It has been months since I haven't gone over my 200/mo, for overage charges of $.05/msg. I'm generally only going over to the tune of 200-300 messages (a total of 400-500/mo), so paying overage of $10-15. Not much, but it only looks like it'll go up from here - my texting is gradually increasing, and I need to increase my messaging plan soon.
AT&T offers me a few simple, obvious, and nonetheless stupid options to increase my service. First is that I could ditch my current grandfathered-in features plan and sign up for their current unlimited-data-and-msgs plan... for $50/mo (monthly total: $87+taxes).
Second, I could keep my current $20/mo plan and add on unlimited texting atop it for another $20/mo (monthly total: $77+taxes.) This won't actually save me money until the point that I regularly start going over my current plan by 400 messages ($20 in overage charges) (total 600 msgs.)
Third, there also MIGHT be the option to stack a separate 200-msg plan for $5/mo on top of my unlimited-data-200-msg plan, meaning $25/mo for unlimited data and 400 total msgs (monthly total: $62+taxes.) But I AM going over that amount regularly, so that's stupid.
I really don't want to have to worry about the number of texts I'm leaving. What I really want is a non-stupidly-expensive option for getting unlimited texts as well as data.
---
Today I went into the T-Mobile store and explained to them where I was. Not looking for a new phone, but looking for a plan with unlimited data and messages and very low voice minutes at a price competitive with AT&T. And it turns out they have exactly that! There is a 300-daytime-minutes, unlimited-weekends voice plan for $30/mo to which I could add their "total internet & messaging" plan for $35/mo, making $65+taxes. Unlimited. $22 less than AT&T's comparible version. AND I was told that doing this without purchasing a phone could get me in without signing a contract (just a credit check, but I'd pass that with flying colors), AND that if I end up at any point actually needing a phone, I could then buy a phone with a contract and be treated as a brand-new customer for the purposes of such. So, all in all, a good deal. (Oh, the downside is I'd need to get my phone unlocked, which so far with two different quotes is a $50 process.)
So first questions: How good is T-Mobile? Who uses them? Any issues I might want to know about? Anyone know the quality and speed of their data coverage? Would you suggest switching?
---
All this said... I like being a loyal customer to a company that has otherwise treated me well, and giving them a chance to keep me. But I suck royally and amazingly on the phone with businesspeople.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
londo used to make all the phone calls in the house because I cave to the illusion of authority. I don't haggle. I take "no" way too easily. But I'm trying to gear myself up to make this phone call to AT&T to "threaten" them with my business leaving, and it would help if I had as much information about the process as possible.
Therefore, second questions: What division of AT&T do I want to call to try and haggle them down to match T-Mobile's prices? How does this procedure work? Do I open right out with my pitch, full bore, on the first poor schmuck I get on the phone? (I figure my pitch is, "I've been a loyal customer for 6 years and have always paid my bills on time, but your competitors are able to offer me comperable service for $20 less. All I want is unlimited texting added to my current unlimited data plan for $10 more a month, not to switch up to the smartphone plan for $30 more a month.") Are the folks on the phone actually able to do that? Will I have to climb the supervisor ladder until I'm talking to Randall Stephenson and pulling our shared Boomer-Sooner alumni status on him to get me this deal? How hard-assed do I be, how arrogant about being a customer willing to take her service away, and when do I back down?
That kind of thing is completely out of my comfort zone and element, so as you can see I need a lot of assistance. However, asusernamenumber advised me earlier, it's not like I have anything to lose. AT&T can't take away my current service or charge me more because I've called up and threatened to leave their services and asked for a deal to stay. So this should be great experience in trying to have some semblance of a backbone on the phone! But... I'd still like to have a solid footing on wtf I'm doing first. So if anyone with experience can help just give me a talk through how that might go, I'd really appreciate it.
When I moved to Massachusetts 6 years ago, I signed up with then-Cingular for a pretty awesome at the time combo mp3-player/phone. Over the past 6 years, I have upgraded only once, from that phone to my current Treo 650. Only the first phone had a 2-year contract; the past 4 years have been pay-as-I-go. The only problem I've ever had has been a technical failure on the phone itself, which was solved by by-that-time-AT&T quickly and quite easily to me. I still have the base phone plan I started with 6 years ago! When I got the Treo I added a data and messaging plan to my bill, and it has done quite well by me until recently.
I use very, very few actual phone minutes. The base plan I started with 6 years ago is still excessive: 250 daytime minutes and unlimited nights and weekends for $37/mo. The past few months I've used 119 (day)/223 (night/wkd), 51/317, 38/171, and 92/518. I really don't need a high-minutes voice plan.
The features plan I got for my Treo back in the day started out with a limit on both data and messaging, but I found that with the cool things I could do with my phone (IRC, Google Maps, web browsing, email) I was consistently going over on data, so I upgraded to unlimited data + 200 msgs/month for $20. This is the plan I still have, though it has been phased out as an option for new clients.
This means that my monthly bill should be $57+taxes.
---
Texting has kind of taken off. I don't even pipe Twitter to my phone (though sometimes I use it to tweet out), but the various ways in which text messages are useful have become evident on my bill. It has been months since I haven't gone over my 200/mo, for overage charges of $.05/msg. I'm generally only going over to the tune of 200-300 messages (a total of 400-500/mo), so paying overage of $10-15. Not much, but it only looks like it'll go up from here - my texting is gradually increasing, and I need to increase my messaging plan soon.
AT&T offers me a few simple, obvious, and nonetheless stupid options to increase my service. First is that I could ditch my current grandfathered-in features plan and sign up for their current unlimited-data-and-msgs plan... for $50/mo (monthly total: $87+taxes).
Second, I could keep my current $20/mo plan and add on unlimited texting atop it for another $20/mo (monthly total: $77+taxes.) This won't actually save me money until the point that I regularly start going over my current plan by 400 messages ($20 in overage charges) (total 600 msgs.)
Third, there also MIGHT be the option to stack a separate 200-msg plan for $5/mo on top of my unlimited-data-200-msg plan, meaning $25/mo for unlimited data and 400 total msgs (monthly total: $62+taxes.) But I AM going over that amount regularly, so that's stupid.
I really don't want to have to worry about the number of texts I'm leaving. What I really want is a non-stupidly-expensive option for getting unlimited texts as well as data.
---
Today I went into the T-Mobile store and explained to them where I was. Not looking for a new phone, but looking for a plan with unlimited data and messages and very low voice minutes at a price competitive with AT&T. And it turns out they have exactly that! There is a 300-daytime-minutes, unlimited-weekends voice plan for $30/mo to which I could add their "total internet & messaging" plan for $35/mo, making $65+taxes. Unlimited. $22 less than AT&T's comparible version. AND I was told that doing this without purchasing a phone could get me in without signing a contract (just a credit check, but I'd pass that with flying colors), AND that if I end up at any point actually needing a phone, I could then buy a phone with a contract and be treated as a brand-new customer for the purposes of such. So, all in all, a good deal. (Oh, the downside is I'd need to get my phone unlocked, which so far with two different quotes is a $50 process.)
So first questions: How good is T-Mobile? Who uses them? Any issues I might want to know about? Anyone know the quality and speed of their data coverage? Would you suggest switching?
---
All this said... I like being a loyal customer to a company that has otherwise treated me well, and giving them a chance to keep me. But I suck royally and amazingly on the phone with businesspeople.
londo used to make all the phone calls in the house because I cave to the illusion of authority. I don't haggle. I take "no" way too easily. But I'm trying to gear myself up to make this phone call to AT&T to "threaten" them with my business leaving, and it would help if I had as much information about the process as possible.Therefore, second questions: What division of AT&T do I want to call to try and haggle them down to match T-Mobile's prices? How does this procedure work? Do I open right out with my pitch, full bore, on the first poor schmuck I get on the phone? (I figure my pitch is, "I've been a loyal customer for 6 years and have always paid my bills on time, but your competitors are able to offer me comperable service for $20 less. All I want is unlimited texting added to my current unlimited data plan for $10 more a month, not to switch up to the smartphone plan for $30 more a month.") Are the folks on the phone actually able to do that? Will I have to climb the supervisor ladder until I'm talking to Randall Stephenson and pulling our shared Boomer-Sooner alumni status on him to get me this deal? How hard-assed do I be, how arrogant about being a customer willing to take her service away, and when do I back down?
That kind of thing is completely out of my comfort zone and element, so as you can see I need a lot of assistance. However, as
usernamenumber advised me earlier, it's not like I have anything to lose. AT&T can't take away my current service or charge me more because I've called up and threatened to leave their services and asked for a deal to stay. So this should be great experience in trying to have some semblance of a backbone on the phone! But... I'd still like to have a solid footing on wtf I'm doing first. So if anyone with experience can help just give me a talk through how that might go, I'd really appreciate it.