I signed on for an AT&T plan with Continental points, got it for a month (pretty much, at any rate). The next month they dropped the plan and gave me full retail, which was huge. Not only will they not give me the deal they promised (5 cent all day every day, toll, out of state, in state with a $4.95 fee), now they will not reinstate the deal they actually gave me (5 cent all day instate only inc tolls, $4.95 fee plus 5 cent off peak, 7 cent on out of state with additional $2 fee). They are saying it is no longer offered for new customers. I am not new - this would be a re-instatement. The best they will do now is 5 cent off peak, 7 cent on for everything with a fee of ?? This company also tried to stick my daughter with a $300 cell phone charge when she only owed $100. AT&T is a huge disappointment. Naturally, I will leave them but wanted all of you to be aware of their practices and hardly anyone accesses the AT&T site. As in, why I am posting here.

Ever been disappointed by a long distance company?
You will.

Karen2,

The same thing happened to me. I called AT&T to complain and got nowhere (with 20+ min of arguing). I then asked for a supervisor and had the promise of a credit within 10 minutes. Immediately after that call, I contacted my local carrier (who is the billing middleman) and notified them.

Of course, I'll believe the credit when I see it. BTW, MCI is my new carrier. They are providing a $20/month bill credit for five months. Also, I get 5c offpeak and 7c onpeak. $4.95/month.

After a total of 2 hours of haggling, they are promising a refund and reinstatement of the plan they think I was supposed to have. A half hour was completely wasted when AT&T disconnected me and made me start over. I was so frosted that I suggested that a company that cannot keep someone on line should not be in the phone business. I will believe the refund when I see it. Verizon, my local carrier, says it could take 3 billing cycles and if I do not pay the full amount now, my phone service will be disconnected! Verizon denied sending a close order and called AT&T a liar while AT&T gave me an order number (turns out it is an internal number which meant nothing to Verizon)and swore that Verizon was lying. Who cares? Why am I in the middle? They refused to talk directly to each other. What a mess. MCI was not talking a great program today when I called them, however.

Karen,
AT&T gave me that close order bull**** also. This is definitely an AT&T problem. My local carrier, Qwest/USWest, is not making me pay the disputed amount. This is an old hat for me, as it is the third time I've been screwed on an airline-related telephone plan. The first time was with the MCI/Continental coupon from the Prestige Pack, whereby I was supposed to get $25 bill credits for four months. The second was with an MCI/AA deal, where I was also supposed to get bill credits. Both times, after disputing with MCI and USWest, they eventually posted.

It sounds like Verizon (what a stupid name) is as bad as AT&T and MCI. For once, I am happy to have QWEST (what a stupid name). ;

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Karen, never-never-never use phone service for earning miles. It will make you crazy and you won't be able to concentrate on making miles any other way. Use the money you save by signing with a normal plan sans miles, and put that money towards a mileage run. You'll be happier and healthier.

I completely agree.

Why anyone should be paying a monthly fee and more than 5-6 cents a minute anytime to get a few miles is foolish.

Just head over to essential.com or one of the other long-distance aggregators and save some serious, serious cash. I was offered a nickel anytime (no monthly fee) and 1,000 free minutes when I signed up.

When AT&T calls you back (and they will, monthly - trust me) tell them the story and then tell them to pound sand.

Yes, I have had problems with AT&T and MCI. However, when I went to the FCC web site and filled out a complaint, low and behold my old prgrams were back, even after I was told that the program had ended and no one could use them. I am now on an MCI 5c half the time, 7c the rest, but make most of my calls during the 5c period.

There is no questions, LD companies have about as much compliance with the law as airlines!

I hate AT&T as well and have told them never to mail or call me again. They charged me $7.00 a MINUTE for a call to Brasil which they insisted was operator assisted (which it was not). After being on the phone for 4 hours (I kid you not)- half of which was on hold with several supervisors, managers, etc. they refused to cancel the charge. Thank god the call only lasted 2 minutes. I immediately cancelled my service with them - on that same 4 hour call.

I now get AA miles with the same pricing as JRF in MCI.

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I wish I were 1,000 miles away

May I just politely suggest we keep the phone posts in the phone forums. Actually, if anyone reads the posts going back in any of the phone forums, we would see we ALL have horror stories with every one of the companies. Just a polite suggestion to keep The Buzz a bit less cluttered. No flames please