An MCI salesman called me last night to see if he could entice me, 'a good former customer', to return to MCI. I listened to his offer - he offered 7 cents/minute anytime, with the $3.95/month fee waived (no mention of a time limit), AND a immediate 5000 DL SkyMiles bonus plus 1000 miles/month for 5 more months for a total of 10,000 bonus miles. Of course he offered to pay the $5.00 Verizon switching fee. And then he asked about cell phones (I have 3 on a family share-a-minute plan)- I told him I was under contract, and he said that he couldn't touch the contract but offered the 7 cents rate for whenever I exceeded the monthly minutes maximum and for calling outside of the local cell area. He stated that not all areas were available for this last offer, but entered my cell phone number into a computer and responded that yes, I was eligible.

I said that all of this sounded pretty good - lets go for it.

Fortunately, the verifiers were all busy and he said that they and MCI customer service would soon call me back - 2 separate calls. About 20 minutes later, MCI customer service called me. I stated that I had not yet been contacted by a verifyer. This rep seemed surprised by that, but said, lets complete the order anyway, and then he would move me to the verifier. Now the problems began. He affirmed the 7 cents/minute, but stated that the monthly fee waiver was for 12 months only- I told him that that was not what I was offered. Then he said that there was no way to do the cell phone offer - they had been having problems with sales offering this, and just could not do it. The next to final straw was when he said that the monthly fee waiver and the SkyMiles bonus were separate offers and only 1 offer per phone was permitted. That was when I first mentioned bait and switch. But he said, he could arrange an immediate credit for 12 months times the $3.95 monthly calling plan fee AND do the SkyMiles offer. I said, well, let's proceed. The FINAL straw was when he then said that he could not find the bonus code for the 10,000 SkyMiles offer and would I be willing to settle for the initial 5000 SkyMiles bonus only. At that time, I stated that this bait and switch was totally unacceptable, and cancel the entire order. I never heard from a verifier.

Curiously, when I asked the original Salesman for his name, he unreluctantly told me Jesse Adams. But when I asked the customer service rep for his name, he told me Jesse (it was not the same Jesse) - but when I asked for a last name, he said that he was not permitted by MCI to give his last name - this seemed strange to me. That is, the independent salesman contractor - not an MCI employee - gave me the complete information, but the MCI customer service rep (an MCI employee) wouldn't.
All of this fiasco wasted about 30 minutes of my time, to no avail. My conclusion is to be sure I ask both for names and offer codes at the time of the calls, or decline to proceed - any advice from other, more experienced folks with the LD service offers?